RE KA STREE I Reader's Feast Privileged 100 Years of Ulysses receive Vouchers to the Readers To celebrate the centenary of publication of James Joyce 's value of 10% of your total purchases every Ulysses Reader's Feast Bookstore is delighted to announce two 6 months. Melbourne exclusives: Quarterly Book Guides, your essential guide to the best new books. Colm Toibin "In Concession Prices on Melbourne Writers' Festival sessions and Writers at Como. Conversation" at Reader's Feast Bookstore . The much cele "In Conversation" Ask our staff how to join , there are no fees brated Irish writer and guest of The 2004 Age at Reader's Feast Bookstore. The or minimum purchase requirements. Melbourne Writers' Festival author of this years literary sen Reader's Feast Bookstore Thursday August 26th , 6.30pm, $6.00 (inc GST) sation The Shadow of the Wind Midtown Plaza Bookings essential on (03) 9662 4699 and guest of The 2004 Age Corner Bourke & Swanston Sts u"""''" ,.," Melbourne Writers' Festival Melbourne, 3000 In October 1998 one of Joyce's childhood homes, in Drumcondra , Friday August 27th, 6.30pm, $6 (inc GST) Ph : (03) 9662 4699 Ireland was demolished despite the existence of a preservation Bookings essential on (03) 9662 4699 Fax: (03 ) 9663 3726 order. The remains , 18 truckloads of this rubble , were purchased [email protected] by Brendan Kilty with the intention to build seats around the world 'Shadow is more than a book about a book-it's an with a brick from this house. Reader's Feast are proudly initiating inspired homage to the book, a celebration of wri t To subscribe to the Melbourne Writers' and sponsoring a "Joycean Seat" for Melbourne. Calm Toibin will ing , an exhortation to read.' Weekend Australian Festival mailing list please contact join Brendan Kilty to launch Melbourne's seat at the State Library (03) 9645 9244 or email to Victoria : 'A big baroque bag of gothic horrors. The book is [email protected] written by someone witty and knowing enough to spoof him "Joycean Seat" Unveiling self, while still being able to ra ise READhl{'~---~ Forecourt, State Library of Victoria, the hairs on the back of your Swanston Street, Melbourne neck ... Carlos Ruiz Zaf6n's zest Thursday August 26th , at 11.00am is infectious.' Economist FEAST Official Booksellers for The 2004 Melbourne Writers' Festival Bookstore
Young Writers' Scholarship 'Est The Friends of Eureka Street pro~ram is offerin~ - two scholarships to youn~ writers a~ed 18-30. Winners will receive: • a subscription to Eureka Street • a scholarship of$1000 Winners would submit three pieces of work to Eureka Street during 2005. Applicants should include: • a copy of their CV (no more than two pa~es) • a letter of application • two or three samples of writin~ (published or unpublished) and send to Youn~ Writers' Scholarship Jesuit Publications PO Box 553 Richmond VIC, 3121 No later than 1 October, 200'+ (Further information at www.eurekastreet.com.au) <> Os: ' > CCl $:)> EUREKA STREE ImN zm~z cO $:..,., co-o mC ,.,"""'c - n C)>c;:-n COMMENT t ;;; )> c"" 4 Andrew Hamilton Moral equivalence Cly> C--i V> I --jm rv)> OAl LETTERS 0 --i ..,. V> )> 6 Lachlan Harris, Joan Healy z 0 34 Gone surfin' --i I rides the wave of m THE MONTH'S TRAFFI C Alison Aprhys 0 surfie culture. 5 9 Peter Pierce Dunk Island Cl 9 Aaron Martin Am erican dream 36 Vol atile democracy -< 10 Anthony Ham Wedding belle Dewi Anggra eni on Indonesia's presidential election. 38 A tale of two cities COLUMNS Don Gazzard visits the nati onal 7 Capital letter libraries of France and Britain. Ja ck Waterford Strike up the band 47 O n taking to the bed 11 By the way Brian Doyle flees from the world. Brian Matthews Inferno bound 48 A century of giving 12 Archimedes Juliette Hughes and Lucille Hughes Tim Thwaites Conga compounds look at the legacy of the Felton Bequest. 13 Summa Theo logiae fames McEvoy Today's religion IN PRINT 54 Watching brief Publisher Andrew Hamilton ~~ 26 Future nation Editor Marcelle Mogg Ju liette Hughes Pushed and hushed address at the Assistant editor Beth Doherty Sir Gerard Brennan's Graphic des igners Janneke Storteboom launch of Mark McKenna's This and Ben Hider SNAPSHOT Country: A Reconciled Republic! Director Christopher Gleeson >t Business manager Mark Dowell 8 Of wigs, Darwin, polls, gongs and fiestas 41 Rhythm of li fe Marketing & advertising manager Ca mille Perwssion by Ja y Verney is reviewed by Collins Matthew Lamb. Subscriptions Denise Campbell POETRY Editorial, production and administration 42 City terraces assistants Gera ldine Battersby, Lee Beasl ey, 16 Kate Llewellyn Ghazal, The boat, and What Ben Hider, An na Muston Peter Yule's Carlton: A History Film editor Siobhan Jackson I have lost reviewed by Philip Harvey. Poetry editor Philip Harvey jesuit editorial board Virginia Bourke, Marie 44 Irish dignity Tehan, Jane Mayo Carolan, Christopher FEATURES Gary Pearce reviews Lady Gregory's Gleeson >1, Marcelle Mogg, Jack Wa terford. Toothbrush by Colm T6ibin. Patrons Fureka Street gratefully 14 Th e threat to empire acknowledges the support of Luke Fraser suggests that ageing 46 Not easy bei ng green C. and A. Carter; th e trustees of the estate of Matthew Lamb examines Bob Brown's Miss M. Condon; W.l'. & M.W. Gurry populations will be the West's downfall. Memo fo r a Saner World. 18 Women of Islam Eureka Street magazine, MN 1036- 1758, 50 Shortl ist Austra lia Post Print Post Jpproved Dorothy Horsfield finds out what Muslim pp349181 /00314, is published ten time; a women want. Reviews of the books: A man after his year by Eureka Streel Magazine Pty Ltd, own heart; The Master; Car wars: How 300 Victoria St reet, Ri chmond VIC ll2 I 20 More powerful and more lofty passions the car won our hearts and conquered PO Box 553, Ri chmond VIC 3 121 Christine Williams m eets Peter Garrett. Tel: 03 9427 73 11 Fax: 01 9428 4450 our cities; and Travellers' Tales. emai l: [email protected] es uit .org.au 22 Operation in progress http://www.eurekastree t. com.au/ Peter Davis on peace in the Solomon Responsibi lity fo r editorial co nt enl is ON STAGE accepted by Andrew Hamilton st, Islands. 300 Victoria Stree\, Ri chmond 24 Good advice, falling on deaf ea rs ? 51 Fl y fishing Printed by Doran Printing 46 Industrial Drive, Braeside VIC 3195. Tony Kevin considers the cost of the free Steve Game looks at recent offerings © jesuit Publi ca tions 2004 tra de agreement. from Opera Australia. Unsoli ci ted manu scr ipt s wi ll not be returned. Please do not send original 28 Hands on pho1ographs or art work unless requesled. Morag Fra ser m eets recent travellers FLASH IN THE PAN Requests for permi ssion to reprint material to East Timor. from th e magazine should be addressed in 52 Reviews of the fil m s Tray, Harry Potter writ ing to th e editor. 30 Th e so ns of privilege and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Th e Da y Anthony Ham on the kingdom of Saudi This month After Tomorrow and The Cooler. Cover des ign: Jannckc Storteboom Arabia. All illust rations by Janneke Stortcboom 33 Rom e and th e bush unless otherwi se indi ca ted. PUZZLED Cart oons: Bru ce Duncan looks at the church's Dean Moore p 41 & 45. response to the Iraq war. 55 Joan Nowotny Cryptic era word Andrew H amilton Moral equivalence
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In the tab United States interrogators in Abu Ghraib with loid version, outrage at the torture of prisoners at Saddam's treatment of prisoners, for example, Abu Ghraib prison is countered by the argument would be illegitimate if it simply insinuated that that the regime of Saddam Hussein was far worse. both parties were as bad as each other. It would Implicit in this argument is the claim that where invoke moral equivalence improperly. But it would two groups do terrible things to one another, the be legitimate to make this comparison in order to sins of the more obnoxious group disqualify criti underline the evil of torture by forces with which cism of the other. Critics should focus on the rela we are allied. It would also be proper to use the tive goodness and evil of the regimes, and not on the comparison in order to show that the roots of all morality of the actions of the better party. torture lie in giving people power to use and abuse The broadsheet use of the principle of moral other human beings with impunity. To identify equivalence is more sophisticated. If you compare this kind of argument with an improper use of what was once done at Abu Ghraib under Saddam the doctrine of m oral equivalence would Hussein with what is now done under United States be to reduce morality to politics. rule, I will criticise your doctrine of moral equiva lence. I imply that you dismiss the moral difference E NALLY, THE DOCTRINE of m oral equivalence is between the two regim es, and undermine commit tricky to use, because it rests on a paradox. At one ment to a just and necessary cause. level, morality is built on moral equivalence. It Three things need to be said about reference to assumes that the lives of all human beings m atter the principle of moral equivalence. First, in itself, equally, no m atter who and where they are. Because the charge of comparing one regime with another the life of the Iraqi prisoner in proves nothing. Comparisons do not prove moral an American jail matters as judgm ents. Nor do they falsify them . At best they much as the life of the Ameri On inspection, evil illuminate them, and at worst they obscure them . can prisoner in an Iraqi jail it is Second, conversation about morality becomes wrong to torture either. On the doers always turn useful when we speak about actions. Discus basis of this moral equivalence, sion about whether people are good or evil we are committed to criticise belongs in the primary school yard. On inspec the evil policies and practices out to be diminished tion, evil doers always turn out to be dimin of our own society as much as ished human beings, and to compare their those of other nations. Apolo human beings, and to m oral culpability with that of others assumes gists for evils like detention a God's eye view. It also obscures the fact and wars lightly undertaken do compare their moral that good people can do terrible things. not accept this moral equi va lence. They ask us to m easure culpability with that w MAY, HOWEVER, COMPARE the moral qual what we do to others by dif ity of actions done in the nam e of different govern ferent standards than what is of others assumes a ments. We can also compare the policies from which done to us. these actions flow. We may say, for example, that At a deeper level, the Cod's eye vtew. a nation which cares for the human dignity of its m oral equivalence that values citizens by guaranteeing them shelter, food, educa each human being equally, is tion, personal security and the opportunity to shape based on a deeper lack of moral equivalence. The society, is a better society than one where people are ground of morality is the conviction that each ro utinely starved, exploited, tortured or killed. Kirk human being is uniquely precious. Because each patrick is right to deny that abuses in a generally human being is unique and o ultimately incompa humane society make it m orally indistinguishable rable with others, we may not treat human beings from a brutal society. To justify such a judgment, simply as m embers of a group, but we must respect we would need to compare in detail the abuses of the dignity of each . That means not treating an y human dignity in each society, and examine their body as a m eans to an end, whether by detaining context. children in order to send signals, bombing people But the relative justice of a society does not to implant democracy, or torturing som e people to entitle it to act as it wills towards a less just soci save the lives of other . ety. Nor is it entitled to endorsem ent of its unjust Ultimately, the coins of morality are stamped actions. If the United States has acted badly in going with individual human faces, each of which is pre to war and in conducting it, it is important to pro cious. The principle of moral equivalence is benign test at the incompatibility between its ideals and when it defends each of those different faces. The what it does. real perversion of the principle can be seen in the Third, comparisons made between nations hooded faces and naked bodies at Abu Ghraib. • on the basis of what they do are not necessarily illegitimate. To compare the torture practiced by Andrew Hamilton SJ is Eurel JULY- AUG UST 2004 EU REK A STR EET 'how great Aussies are,' or feel a lump in fronted with the reality of suffering from the back of your throat when you hear earlier child welfare practices, and with the national anthem, think of the kid we the trauma of the 'stolen generations.' letters locked up for five years, five months and 20 There are lessons to be learned from days so we didn't send the wrong message these experiences. Any failure in care of to people smugglers. This child and his children diminishes us all. We know that mother were released from Port Hedland now. Nevertheless, between 1999 and Unfit to govern detention centre on 12 May 2000, after 2003, 2,184 children were held in deten eventually being assessed as refugees. tion. It was eventually established that The statements and actions of the 92 per cent of these were genuine refu When questioned about the findings of Howard Government are those that damn gees entitled to seek asylum. They and the HREOC report, that indefinite man a generation. their parents were no threat to Australia. datory detention of children amounted As a nation we must make a decision It would seem that we have not learned. to 'cruel, inhumane and degrading treat that the freedom of children is simply too There are still more than 160 children ment,' John Howard replied, 'We don't high a price to pay. No amount of border in detention. In the mainstream media, like detaining children, we really don't, protection is worth one night of a child's comment on their plight has dwindled, but the problem is that if you reverse freedom, and no amount of deterrence is while comment on the treatment of the the policy of mandatory detention you worth one second of stolen innocence. prisoners in Iraq is undiminished. Where will be sending a beckoning, a signal to If this government cannot come up is the moral indignation and shame people smugglers ... '. His comments sup with strategy for protecting our borders over the revelations in the HREOC ported those made earlier by Immigration and deterring people smugglers that does report? Documented violations arc not Minister Amanda Vanstone. not involve breaching the human rights even denied. Is it because there are no The Australian people are using the of children, then they simply no longer photographs to focus our attention? Is indefinite mandatory detention of chil have the policies, the imagination, the it because we cannot bear to imagine a dren as a border protection tool. We are humanity, and the dignity that is required shameful system operating in our coun expending the liberty of these kids in order to govern this country. try? Surely it is not true that the majority to purchase the security of our borders and Lachlan Harris of Australians would be willing to pay for the deterrence of people smugglers. Canberra, ACT 'the integrity of our borders' by inflicting Next time you hear a tourist tell you suffering on children? The HREOC report set June 10 as the Suffer the date by which viable solutions should be found for those children still in children detention. There are well documented alternatives which respect the dignity of First we heard of the families and their children. June 10 has International Committee of come and gone. Protests have attracted the Red Cross report of prisoner little attention. abuse in Iraq, not a published Many courageous and compassionate "When I was a child I was taught about report, but leaked information. Australians have worked doggedly over Jesus, and I asked where He lived. This rightly caused outrage these past years for asylum seekers to be 'Above the clouds; was the reply. 'Well, around the world and ongoing treated with dignity. The HREOC report front page stories. Then we heard vindicates their selfless work. We urge I wish He'd stick His hand through and of the Human Rights and Equal the government to act with similar integ wave to me sometimes: I said. You see, Opportunity Commission's rity, and to put an end, once and for all, I was asking questions even then!" report of 'cruel, inhumane and to a practice which offends fair-minded Singer and children's entertainer degrading' treatment of chil Australians. Franciscus Henri dren in Australia's detention Sr Joan Healy RSJ centres over a period of year . Sisters of St Joseph ''As the only Anglican bishop to have Our government did not deny Congregational Leadership Team knowledge of this report, it was North Sydney, NSW publicly endorsed the Australian simply dismissed. Government's case for war, I now The abuse of prisoners in concede that Iraq did not possess Iraq has rightly caused dismay ture/..a Strlo'el welcomes let!C'rs from it> re,lders. weapons of mass destruction (WMD):' and horror. Harm caused to Short letter<; JrC' more likely to be published, c~nd .111 Bp to the Defence Forces, Dr Tom Frame children is surely at least of letters may he edited. Lcttl·r~ must hC' sigm•d, .llld equal concern. All Australians, shou ld include a cor1tac t phone number and the Mention this ad for a free sample copy of lMA and especially those of us IHiter'<; name ,Jild ,!ddres<;. Send to: Phone: (03) 9653 4221 who work for the welfare of C'urek.1~ 1 ' JPSpub.jesuit.org.ilu or or email: [email protected] children, continue to be con- PO Box r,r, l , Richmond VI( l12 I 6 EUREKA STREET JULY-AUGUST 2004 capital letter Strike up the band INTHEORY, THE STAGE" SET. An election could be a< wly But a gig with Labor must have enormous attractions. A per as August, more likely October. Strictly it could be as late as son like Garrett could make a difference, the more so because March next year, but there is little chance of it following the in him there is a compromising and pragmatic element, which US presidential election in early November. John Howard is would prefer achievement to the personal reward of being rolling out cheques to two million households; the budget will pure. Even if he must compromise, Garrett can be a beacon of deliver tax cuts for the administrative and professional classes. moral integrity to those natural constituents of Labor who are Medicare, he hopes, is neutralised as an issue, if not turned profoundly disillusioned by its moral failures of the past few into a positive, and further taxpayer millions are spent promot years. Indeed, simply by being there, Garrett can help rebuild ing it in a partisan way. The Treasury is looted for sectional idealism, ideas and membership. No wonder some of the tired programs designed to square off sugar farmers, the roads infra and corrupt old factional chiefs are horrified. Garrett may be structure lobby and any environmental swinging vote capable able to reassure Labor voters that the party still has a of being garnered. A bit of symbolism is put up-on access to moral compass. the Medicare records of adolescents for parents, the banning of homosexual marriages, and denying prisoners a vote at the ITrs HARD, HOWEVER, to imagine Peter Garrett drawing a election-not seriously, but so as to remind everyone that the single vote away from the coalition. He may pull Green votes Liberal and National Parties are the parties of god and conserv back to Labor, whether directly or by ensuring that the second ative values. preference goes to Labor. But this almost invariably occurs, Mark Latham seems to be travelling fairly well. Polling evi independent of Green leaders. Threats by Bob Brown to with dence suggests that the budget give-aways did not do much for the hold preferences from Labor, or to direct them to the coalition, coalition. Labor is still the party of choice on domestic govern are hollow and unconvincing. But Brown represents a threat in ment entitlement issues, particularly health, education and com other ways. He has himself stolen Labor votes particularly in mtmity services. No-one has a clue what Labor will do in such safe Labor seats. Indeed, his biggest single constituency of late areas: it simply has not spelt out its approach, even if it has tried has been the natural Labor voter disgusted by Labor's shameful to make it clear that it is aware of the financial bottom-line. record on core issues. His next biggest constituency is environ Labor is deliberately silent on an array of core emotional mental and this is unlikely to shift to Garrett. The next, oddly, issues-immigration numbers, refugees, Aborigines, and jus consists of religious fundamentalists, perhaps attracted by the tice and human rights-because it believes that voters instinc millenarianism or the absolutism of the Greens. These too, are tively know that Labor is on the decent side of such debates. unlikely to rush to Latham. Raising the profile creates the risk of the coalition using such The second issue is Iraq and the US. John Howard has matters as a wedge through appeals to Hansonism, or creating pulled out every stop and called in every debt, in lining up the false impression (already used by Howard to some effect) Americans to assert that Mark Latham is imperilling the al that core Labor is nothing more than a collection of busybodies liance. Whether it has worked is moot. Even if John Kerry has with special, un-Australian interests, privileging access to les been prevailed upon to express concern, the fact is that the bians, wags, Abos, tree-buggers, dole-bludgers, union heavies Democrat contender is campaigning on Iraq as Bush's disas and human rights lawyers, who divide the cake while ordinary trous war, not as America's disastrous war. The likelihood is decent working men and women miss out. Since Mark Latham that Iraq will get worse, not better, as the US election nears. If has no record of pandering to such groups it's the Government Latham holds his nerve, he will benefit by holding an opinion which runs the risk of the grenade blowing up in its face. At contrary to Howard's, so neutralising Howard's capacity to use least Latham's strategists believe and hope so. national security as a wedge. This leaves two pots boiling on the stove. One is Peter What Howard desperately needs is for an issue to blow up Garrett whose significance may lie more in a reputation for in his favour. A piece of luck like Tampa. A piece of unbelieva ideals and speaking his mind than for his reputation as an en ble political luck- dare one say it-like September 11. Howard vironmentalist and pop singer. His natural constituency is the has always had his share, but he has made his share of luck too. Greens; the party which has successfully assaulted the intellec As things stand, however, he badly needs it, and quick. • tual and emotional base of Labor and now seems set to do the same to the Democrats. Garrett's primary pitch is anti-political. Jack Waterford is the editor-in-chief of the Canberra Times. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 7 snap / are made of human hair, and come from for taxation purposes, and more recently India. This origin, however, has raised have supplied talking versions for tel ) questions for the Rabbis: Indian women evision . As one of the major functions have their hair cut in Hindu temples. of governments has been to decide who This fact has led the most authoritative sh ould lose their heads, polling appropri Rabbis to ban Indian wigs on the grounds ately embraces such apparently unrelated they are so intimately associated with activities as cutting off the tops of trees idolatry. T he casuists, undefeated, now and removing horns from cattle. reflect on whether the hairdressers had Polling is now done by pollsters, religious or secular things in mind as whose particular skill is to ask inane they sat in the temple cutting hair. questions at considerable length with Medal I ists the goal of turning people into headless chooks. As is well known, parrots are Congratulations to Morag Fraser, the also commonly named polly. This has former editor of Eureka Street, who been said to refer to the more primitive was awarded a Member of the Order of practice of politicians speaking repeat Australia (AM) in the Queen's Birthday edly about what they have been told, Honours. The many community groups rather than, as in contemporary practice, whom Morag has encouraged and sup ensuring that they were not told at all. ported will feel honoured by the award. This derivation, however, is false. Polly Eureka StTeet basks in the reflected sun is derived from Moll, a diminutive form light both of Morag's medal, and of the of Mary. [See Gangster's Moll, Bloody AM awarded to Fr Kevin Mogg, the uncle Darwin and the dinosaurs Mary, etc.) of the present editor, for his contribution over many decades to social welfare and Christians also struggle with culture. prison ch aplaincy. In Florida, many Christians were dis appointed with the dinosaur exhibition at Disneyland, because it portrayed the reign of dinosaurs as predating human beings. So they opened their own Crea tionist Adventure Land, in which dino saurs are shown to have been created on the sixth cl ay of creation. Souvenirs include fishy T-shirts, depicting Dar Latino fiesta win at the m oment of being engorged by Truth. The struggle between God and the Here's your chance to support the people forces of mammon goes on in the Park of Guatemala at the Third Annual Latino office as well as in the grounds. The taxa C harity Fiesta and get your clancin' shoes tion people came ca lling to seize docu on. Cardinal Oscar Rodriquez wil l make a Splitting hairs m ents. They claimed that the Park had special guest appearance to support Mis paid no taxes. The park owners retorted sion Quetzal in Guatemala. Much needed Casuistry is the art of applying firm laws that churches owed no taxes. funds will go towards scholarships for to s lippery situations. Jesuits were once students at the Quiche Technological famed [notorious) for their skill at it. It Institute. The institute caters for the often produces a more flexible practice indigenous Mayan population by provid than we might expect. [Did eating at ing technological and civic education. 12.15am, for example, break the fast from Saturday, 28 August 2004 midnight once required for communion? Viva Cabaret Yes, said the letter of the law. No, said Level l , 23 1 Smith St., Fitzroy the casuists, not at least if you lived at Ceduna, where rea l midnight ca m e later The fiesta starts at 7pm with Street than the official clocks proclaimed.) Latin Dance Class with choreographer The great exponents of casuistry, C hristian [choreographer of the 'El Tango however, arc the Orth odox jewish Rab Pretty pollies De Roxanne' scene in the film Moulin bis. Their law prohibits married women Rouge). from displaying their hair. This, being Election fever and the polls threa ten. Polls Adults $35, concession $30. Book culturally awkward in Western societies, come from an old English word, referring at VIVA Cabaret on 03 9415 8166 or at led the casuists to approve wearing wigs. to the human head. Governments have missionqu [email protected] or contact Now the best [and most expensive) wigs always liked heads. They counted heads Paolo on 0417 301 154. fl WREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 First Lord of the Admiralty, Earl of Sand bered. Banfield's life is overdue for fr esh the month's wich and inventor of the snack that ena remembrance. On Dunk he would no bled him to linger at the gaming tables. longer find 'the pleasure of the abso traffic On Dunk, Banfield's health quickly lute freedom of isles uninhabited, shores improved. For long a keen naturalist, untrodden'. Indeed he never had, for the he observed the life on and around the Djiru people had fished here for thou island, on land, in the air and the sea. sands of years before Banfield withdrew He discovered a new species of rat that from the world to establish an idyllic, but was named after him. Although h e and strenuous, life on the island. This was his his wife would weather cyclones, and sea-change, when he found how 'Nature, unwelcome visitors, they rejoiced in 'this not under the microscope, behaved', from isle of dreams, of quietude and happiness, his refuge within the Barrier Reef's 'shield this fretless scene; this plot of the Garden of shimmering silver'. of Eden' . His first book The Confessions - Peter Pierce of a Beachcomber (1908) was followed by three m ore, each as alluringly titled as the first: My Tropic Isle (1911), Tropic Days Dunk Island (19 18) and, posthumously, Last Leaves of Dunk Island (1925). "l i{ T r. J. BANIJEJ D When Banfield died of peritonitis in 1923, it was three days before his wife v vHEN 'BEACHCOMBER' FIRST rolled was able to attract a passing steam er. into the language it m eant a wave. Later N ow Banfield and his wife lie under a it would conjure up images of those folk cairn of stones in a clearing behind the who walked beaches without haste to see Dunk Island resort, in the rain forest, what the waves had brought in from the near the swinging bridge over Goo-Tchur sea. Beachcombers were not those wrecks creek. The grave is well-tended. The site of m en who desolately find themselves is quiet, save for bird song and the rum 'on the beach' in stories by Conrad, Ste m aging of crim son-headed bush turkeys. American dream venson and Becke. They are contented Banfield's obdurate solitariness was the bedrock of his literary achievem ent. A souls, able languidly to relish 'drowsy n J[ RI~E A D Ft\1 L OJ COLI J>OWI::Ll noons and evenings steeped in honeyed gentler version of it informs the rever indolence' (in Keats' words, if sadly, not ies of every beach comber. His epitaph of them ). announces that 'If a man does not keep ON12 APRIL 2003, US Secretary of The most famous Australian beach pace with his companions/Perhaps it is Defense Donald Rumsfeld hosted a cock comber, spiritual descendant of Thoreau, because he hears a different drummer/ Let tail party in Washington to celebrate the recluse on a tropical island inside the him step to the music which h e hears'. US 'victory' over Iraqi forces. Dick Cheney, Barrier Reef for nearly 30 years, was Besides the resort, and a farm, most Paul Wolfowitz and representatives of the Edmund James Banfield. A journalist like of Dunk Island is National Pari<. But coalition revelled in the knowledge that his father, Banfield cam e to Australia in not all: in 196 7 Eric Mcllree, Chairman they had proven the world wrong. Conspic 1854, when he was two. After working of the island's then owner Avis Rent-a uously absent was Colin Powell. Queried on the Ararat Advertiser (which stayed Car, ceded land surrounding Banfield's on the matter a State Department official in the family until the 1960s), h e moved grave to the Crown which then vested replied: 'No, people here didn't know about to N orth Queensland. There h e was a it in the University College of Towns that party.' And so began Powell's fa ll from reporter and sub-editor on the Towns ville, now Ja m es Cook University. That grace. ville Bulletin and becam e an advocate thi occurred was the result of another It has been said that it is better to be for N orth Queensland separation. The of the visionary exertions of Professor respected than feared. Before the Iraq war newspaper work led to a nervous collapse. Colin Roderick, on behalf of the Fo un Powell had no shortage of respect in Wash Banfield leased (a nd later selected) a por dation for Australian Literary Studies. ington. Touted as a potential president, tion of land on Dunk Island, where he had Mcllree died soon afterwards when his Powell's career is a true rags to riches story. once camped, and his creative life began m otor boat exploded on Sydney Harbour. Speaking in 1995 on the release of his auto after he moved there in 1897. Banfield's large collection of Aboriginal biography, My Ameri can Journey, Powell He knew the Aboriginal nam e for and N ew Guinea artefacts was tracked told audiences that 'this is a story of a black the island, Coonanglebah, but preferred to his niece's house in Ararat, then trans kid of no early promise from an immigrant Dunk, for the nam es that Cook bestowed ferred to Townsville. The collection was family of limited m eans who was raised 'judicious and expressive-are among the destroyed when Cyclone Althea struck in the South Bronx and somehow rose to most precious historic possessions of Aus the city on Christm as Eve 19 71. become National Security Advisor and tralia'. Sighting this 'tolerable high island' It was not until 2003 that the univer then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff'. in 1770, Cook named it for George Dunk, sity's small claim on Dunk was remem- And subsequently, Secretary of State. Like JULY- AUGUST 2004 EU REKA STR EET CJ Clinton, he embodies the American drea m. to enj oy again the high esteem in which block. Whatever the reasons, the relation Powell's career continued on its upward he was held before the Iraq war. Perhaps ship floundered on the impossibility of its trajectory until the Iraq war. against his better judgment, Powell hung continuation in 1993. In a cabinet largely dominated by nco his career on a politically risky war. For This time around, palace so urces conservatives, Powell was an unusual this he has paid dearly. suggested that Felipe issued his parents choice. His selection was reflective of the - Aaron Martin with an ultimatum: let him marry Letizia high esteem Powell is held in by many in or he would renounce the throne of Spain. Washington. His nam e ga ve Bush's cabinet Even now with the un io n granted royal an air of credibility and prestige. Unlike blessing and having pa ssed without nota others in the Bush administration Powell ble dissent, the couple retain the power served in Vietnam- and won a Bronze Star to capture the public's attention. This is and Purple Heart for his service. Powell has partly because after its surprise election opposed most American military adven in March, the government of Jose Luis tures. This is not because he is a peacenik Rodriguez Zapatero announced a major but he argued that in most conflicts there departure from traditional royal practice: were 'unclear purposes' with no clear 'exit the first-born child of Felipe and Letizia strategy'. These are the lessons he lea rnt will be considered the heir to the throne, from Vietnam. N ot that American power irrespective of gender. is inherently evil-a conclusion that many Aside from such arca ne arguments of deduced from Vietnam-but rather that succession and the right of a future king American power hould be used in a scru to choose his partner, there is a serious pulously calculating way. It is somewhat side to the issue of the monarchy in Spain. surprising then that he became a public Wedding belle Polls consistently show that up to 80 per face for the war by going to the UN. '>I'AN I'ill KOYAI \\'l i) I)INC cent of the Spanish population consider Some have questioned why Powell the monarchy to be an anachronism. went to the UN. In light of his 35-ycar And yet, among the m any Spaniards who career in the army-where there is no B ARELY A WEEK after our Mary became consider themselves nominally republican, higher good than loyalty-it is m ore than the future Queen of D enmark, Spain cel most don't pursue anything beyond vague understandable. Powell showed a soldiers' ebrated its own royal wedding amid much expressions of opinion. An often hea rd loyalty to his superior. Apparently, Bush pomp and ceremony. Like Denmark's refrain describing the royal family is that never asked Powell explicitly what he king-in-waiting, the next Spanish mon 'they don't bother anyone'. That's a lot thought of going to war. As a loya l dep arch, Felipe, m arried a commoner. In a easier to say in Spain than it is in England, uty Powell never volunteered an opinion. further departure from royal tradition, the where the royal family represents twice the Privately, he was more questioning. 'You new princess had been m arried before. The cost to the public purse than their Spanish break it, you own it,' he told Bu sh and marriage of the prince to Letizia Ortiz, for counterparts; there is no royal court in C heney with regard to Iraq. A statement merly a reporter in Iraq and co-presenter of Spain beyond the king's immediate family. that is only beginning to resonate in for TV Espana's nightly news program, caught Spain also has no tabloid newspapers and eign policy circles at the White House. the nation by surprise after a secret court other media widely observe the taboo Since the cocktail party in April 2003 ship. not to intrude into the private lives of Powell has been brought in from the cold. As if that weren't sufficient intrigue, the royals, thereby avoiding the scandals However, his reputation has been tar Felipe had once before been denied per which have dogged the Windsors and so nished. Powell's visit to the UN to present mission to marry the woman of his choice. tarnished their reputation. what always appeared questionable evi Back in 1989, Felipe began to date Isabel Further, there is a strong sense that dence was done at great political risk to his Satorius, a woman of aristocratic blood the Spanish royal family has proved its career. Before this time, Powell was widely whose mother had been twice-divorced. worth. The current king's father was ban respected in Washington and around the Traditionalists pointed to the Spanish ished from the throne by General Franco world. Powell's original stance cautioning royal family's historical requirem ent (more and lived out his life in exile. Six years enthusiasts has been validated by recent a convention than a written rule, originat before Franco's death in 1975, Spain's di c events. The Defense Department arc ing in the 18th century) that any future tator anointed Juan Carlos as his succc sor. becoming increasingly aware of their limi monarch must renounce his right to the In the hands of the young prince, Franco tations. While it m ay be able to win wars throne should he choose to marry a com could, it seems, rest assured that his legacy it is unable to win peace-som ething Sec moner. More importantly at the time, would be protected. Juan Carlos had been retary Powell's department is much better reports circulated that Felipe' parents, groomed from an early age by Franco who equipped for. If Vietnam taught the US one King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia, dis cho e the prince's education and acted as thing it is the limitations of military force. approved of the union although their rea his mentor in affair of state. Whether Powell will be re- appointed sons were never made public nor was their When Franco died, Juan Carlos fo und or retire-resigning would damag the opposition officially confirmed. The most himself in an invidious position. Presid Bush administra tion- is yet to be seen. informed speculation suggested that Isa ing over the nation's transition to democ Regardless of this, Powell is unli kcly ever bel's divorced mother was the stumbling racy, he was deeply mistrusted bee continutYI on page 11 10 EUREKA STREET JU LY- AUGUST 2004 by the way Inferno bound 'I,TIMEUSSNCSS 0' GReAT ART is nOt just' rome< of it Still to feel the rushing air. being around every time you happen to look. It's also that the Trailing along behind and already insecure about be work, whatever it is, and no matter how venerable, strikes you ing on the wrong side, the cautious foreign tourist takes this suddenly with a pointed and surprising contemporary import. quixotic salute to mean that a left turn may be imminent, Take Dante, for instance: 'Midway along the journey of our but not inevitable. Well, the driver may be going to turn. life/I woke to find myself in a dark wood/for I had wandered off Or he may be rejoicing in the warm air. Or he may be about from the straight path'. Rich with metaphoric reverberations to add a cigarette butt to the dance of spring. But let's certainly, but in its third line this famous opening of Canto I not complicate things. of The Inferno uncannily prefigures the modern Italian motor ist. He drives as if he has just woken up, he spears towards any D EPENDING ON YOUR MOOD, general state of health and daylight between cars as if he's emerging gratefully from a dark temperamental equilibrium, driving in Italy is a grand adventure wood, and exhibits an exultant penchant for wandering from the no matter what the season, a nerve-wracking test of courage, straight path. But wait, I am ahead of myself ... wits and imagination. Which brings me back to Dante. It is a shirting May morning in the small southern Italian Italian drivers do not 'wander from the straight path' be fishing village of Santa Maria di Castellabate-a region more cause they are suicidal, although it can sometimes look that or less despised by sophisticated Bolognese, Milanese and way. On the contrary, they are often joyous, full of life. A zest, a Venetians, and probably unimaginable to the exiled Florentine, sense of enormous possibility seems to engulf the Italian male Dante. Such northern loftiness, however, neither impresses when he settles behind the wheel. Even the mundane and often nor concerns me. From where I am sitting, which is in the sun infuriating business of parking is carried out with an inventive outside a bar by the beach, life in Santa Maria looks hard to beat, ness and elan worthier of higher tasks, which is why so many rough hewn though it may be here and there. cars appear to have been abandoned not parked, not angled into I've been in the village long enough to know the bar staff, a gap, but flung there. Maria, Teresa and Costabile; and Angelina at the Paneteria, who Observing at the head of a crocodiling convoy of cars three advises me on the day's bread; the swarthy, unshaven blokes semi-trailers, two international tour buses and a swaying truck who, from the back of their trucks, sell their sturdy vegetables, load of hay, your red-blooded Italian does not sigh, swear or dug that morning, the earth still clinging to the roots; Guido resign himself in the Anglo-Saxon manner. He sees a challenge at the Pesceria who likes to talk about Australian fish; and and begins a long series of experimental swoops over to the op Massimo, sitting in the sun on the steps of his Salone, where posite side of the road looking for a break, tucking himself back I have my hair cut-una spuntatina, non troppo corto-an in into line if a head-on collision looms. Much of this will be done struction which never ceases to amuse him: 'Just a treem,' he one-handed (the left arm is cleaving the breeze, remember) and tries in English, 'non too shorta.' in the midst of animated conversation intermittently requiring This morrling every one is out talking and bustling and call gestures with the other hand. As Dante puts it in the last stanza ing across the narrow, pedestrians-only street, because spring-la of Canto VI, lines 112-113, 'We circled round that curving road primavera- has settled in. while talking/of more than I shall mention at this time ... ' Springtime-which in Australian lore 'brings on the And so, when spring came to Santa Maria di Castellabate, shearing', and in England was once the 'only pretty ring time' and the fishing boat threaded their wakes into the blue waters and induced outbreaks of 'hey nanny no' and other medieval and the nets were run out and the Saturday market started up ejaculations-still loosens inhibitions and changes stodgy rou again and the young men took to their cars and Vespas on the tines. People don't go on pilgrimages any more, but the gusts narrow sun-drenched roads, 'a demon taking possession of the of new perfumes, the sudden warmth of the air, the seductive body/controlling its manoeuvres' (Canto XXXIII, lines 130-131), budding and leafing, the wanton and suggestive profusions I left my car in its garage, lay on the beach and read Dante, en induce Londoners, for example, to take their pints and stand in joying, even that far south of his beloved Florence, 'the lovely groups on the footpaths outside the pubs. In Paris, these vernal things the heavens hold' (Canto XXXIV, line 138). • vibrations bring beautiful young couples on to the streets like colourful teams bursting on to green ovals. And in Italy, drivers Brian Matthews is a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Victoria wind clown the windows of their cars and hang the left arm out University. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EU REKA STR EET 11 his ties to the former regime. It transpired that the king had been secretly cultiva ting contacts with the clandestine democratic archimedes opposition even before Franco died. A suc cessful transition to democratic rule ele vated the king's reputation bu t it was not Congo compounds until 1981 that the king won over most of his detractors. On 23 February of that year, disaffected soldiers seized the fl edgling national par liament during a debate which was being 12 EU REKA STRE ET JULY- AUGUST 2004 summa POETRY PRIZE theologiae The Broadway Poetry Prize is one of Australia's most prestigious competitions for poetry. Today's religion Sponsored by the Broadway Shopping Centre, this year the W T SHAPE" MODeRN WESTERN CULTURE in tod'y' The 20th centmy confronts us with both the grandeur and the misery of modernity-in the United prize for the winning Nations Declaration of Human Rights and Auschwitz to name just two events. poem has been But how are we to account for modernity as a whole? This is an important increased to $6000. question for theology, since faithfully proclaiming the Gospel presumes an insightful understanding of the culture it addresses. Many interpreters of The winning poem wi ll be Western culture fall into what Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor calls the announced at the Australian booster/knocker polarity. The 'knockers' of modern culture argue that with the Poetry Festival, Sydney, on 5 Enlightenment people have lost their faith and as a result Western culture is in September 2004. The judges decline. 'Boosters' argue that through the Enlightenment, the rise of science and reason has enabled moderns to free themselves from their illusions about a god are Jenifer Compton and in order to become who they truly are: a free, self-determining people. Peter Bishop. Although both boosters and knockers provide some pieces of the puzzle, The winning poem will be neither view adequately accounts for modern Western culture. This is not simply a matter of balance-of taking neither an overly optimistic nor an published in the Poets Union excessively pessimistic stance-but rather a question of what constitutes an journal Five Bells. The winning adequate understanding of cultural change. Both boosters and knockers offer poem and shortlisted poems acultural understandings of modernity; neither accounts for the massive will be published by Picaro cultural shift of the last few centuries, which has often been powered by Press and made available Christian understandings and practices. through the Poets Union. Earlier this year, in Modern Social Imaginaries (Duke University Press), Taylor published his account of how we have arrived where we are. He argues Entries should be sent to: that 'central to Western modernity is a new conception of the moral order of The Broadway Poetry Prize society', which originated in the minds of thinkers like Grotius and Locke, and Poets Union grew to influence whole stratas of society until it has become the background PO Box 91 understanding of modernity. Balmain NSW 2041 Taylor describes this modern moral order as 'the society of mutual ben efit'. The idea is that you and I go about our lives as bakers, bankers or priests, The deadline for submissions and fulfilling our own sense of self redounds to the good of all, with plentiful is 26 July 2004. bread, money or spiritual blessings. His argument is that this understanding undergirds the institutions and practices of our culture. The key institutions Further details and entry discussed are: the rise of the modern economy, the public sphere and popular forms are available from sovereignty. In this accessible and thought-provoking book, Taylor analyses the the Poets Union, telephone formation of these institutions. 02 9818 5366, email Taylor's account of modernity is both incisive and deeply sympathetic. There [email protected] or on is no hyperbole here, which is a significant gain since some theological readings li ne at www.poetsunion.com. of modernity reveal more about the theological method adopted than the culture in which we live. His reading enables Christians to avoid the untenable position The Poets Union is supported by of accepting some of modernity's gains-for example, human rights-and recog The Broadway Shopping Centre. nising their significance, while condemning the whole movement of thought and Australia Counc il for the Arts. practice that brought them about. At the same time, Taylor sees a strong place for Leichhordt CounciL NSW Ministry God in modern secular culture: 'God's will can still be very present to us in the for the Arts. Pi coro Press and design of things, in cosmos, state, and personal life. • Gleebooks. James McEvoy teaches at Catholic Theological College, Adelaide. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 13 Luke Fraser The threat to empire An age ing population may be the downfall of the Western empire IN'9'7' BRmSH CORC 14 EU REK A ST RE ET JULY- AUGUST 2004 our, but at a global level, skilled migrants clincher- the actuaries are costing it for are like migratory birds: their concen you. trations m igh t shift, but their overall This is the fa bric of the empire that numbers do not change. And today's youth inherits. But outside the they will age with the rest. borders of in ternet cafes, other strug gles take place. Those on the bottom AG EI N G POPULATION is the off rungs of this world enact a brief cycle of spring of the high standard of living and the birth, growth and decay, as disease, war, frenetic pace of life that we have created for corruption and famine take their toll: in ourselves. Of necessity, dual income fami Nigeria today, around 2 70,000 children lies are much more prevalent than 30 years live with HIV/AIDS. In Rwanda, you ago. As the cost of living increases, people have a better than even chance of dying work longer hours and sacrifice more to before you are 40. In su ch countries, the maintain their quality of life-their house, escape velocity required to ascend to a their car, their holidays, their access to better life is as incalculable as it appears acceptable standards of health and educa im possible. tion, their choice of leisure activities. As Still other countries lie wedged between fertility drops, the age profile increases. As this 'drowning' world and the empire we more people retire, the tax burden shifts to live in; they form the 'developing' world. a pool of younger workers that, in relative This world is working hard to take its place terms, is shrinking. As numbers of retirees at what it perceives to be the table of rela increase, the health system groans under tive affluence and ease-to become citizens the strain. As we develop new medical of empire. In time, such countries may also procedures, new panacea to prolong life find their populations ageing, as they too and its quality, the range and cost of health discover that the price of imperial citizen care increases still further. National health ship prohibits breeding. Viewed from some industry costs are today growing at a1mual celestial vantage point, the world m ust rates that far outstrip the general growth then appear a strange farce: the poorest and in community prices and wages. The bill weakest nations stuck in their slough, the is settled by a dwindling base of 'working age' people. Caugh t in such a trend, living a life David Burke and the that matches the pace and the Institute for on the Study of cost of change becon'les a gam ble on martingale terms-the m~ers Austrahao na l i~y Common stakes are doubled after every loss. Not managing one's wealth Increasing migration can act as a partial and career (such as they may be) GIOUnCI inhibitor for the ageing trend, but perhaps in one's younger years could be Toward a New Australian Spirituality even this rem edy is a mirage. Modern econ ruinous-the greater the degree A Non-Denominational Interfaith (onference Inspirational stories of struggl e and hope omies continue to move away from the of wealth and comfort, the fur from 20 exc iting national and in ternational speakers low-level manufacturing and agricultural ther and harder the fall to rela • Helen Palmer • Bishop Julio Labayen work that can be done at less cost in devel tive poverty for those who slip • Ruth Ostrow • Tenzin Chonyi • Ruth Cilento oping nations. Service industries and high up. • Mohamad Abdalla • Lionel Fifield • James technology are ever-more significant driv Across this empire, the • Rachael Kohn • Rabbi Howard Addison ers of developed economies. And in these response of many is hardly • Jim Gomez • Vicki Walker • George Eaton latter fields, low-s killed labour may not surprising: children become a • Greg Homeming • fi nd a ready home. Equally, skilled migra luxury, as people just try to stay • David Burke tion, which is seemingly a poultice, is in the game. Children certainly • Hannah NJ:I t·n :u,c chimerical: in comparison to refugees and are an expensive choice. In a other low-skilled migrant numbers, skilled recent UK report that surely migrants-those with professional, tech matches the best that Huxley nical or managerial expertise-represent or Zamyatin could produce, it quite a small proportion of total migration was suggested that the cost of levels. Competition to attract such labour raising a child to the age of 21 is intense. Besides, the majority of skilled approaches $360,000. Were you labour is generated from within the ageing to ignore any other evidence of em pire itself. At a national level, attract the difficulty of bringing new ing more young talent is a worthy endeav- life into the world, h ere is the JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 15 developing countries emerging from it to higher ground; the occu pants of the highest ground busily building elaborate ladders. Governments across this empire are beginning to recognise the ageing problem. The tectonic shift in wealth and tax bur den- from youth to old age for the former, the reverse for the lat ter, is starting to be addressed. Future governments will no doubt do more still. But will it be enough? At some point, a question almost antithetical to all of the developed world's wealth creation principles may have to be considered: should we knowingly curtail our standard of living The Boat to preserve the future of this empire? One (the only?) alternative to having more children may All day I row a dinghy be to increase intakes of lower and at night rest the oars One alternative skilled migrants-a mixture of within their rollocks those from the two worlds out yet I move increasingly asleep to having more side the empire: the 'drowning' and the 'developing'. In the or wide awake towards the vast horizon children short to medium term, such lit by stars. people may not add much at all maybe to to the bottom line of a highly New Zealand looms skilled economy. Indeed, their and islands pass while I plout increase intakes presence may drag it down, for a time, away from the rela the paddocks of the sea. of lower-skilled tive wealth and health levels This wooden boat cannot last to which we understandably none ever do- migrants aspire. Yet in the longer term, packed with house and garden the children these new citizens give birth to may arrest the dolls and pens and cloth es and books. ageing process. They may themselves prosper, adding to a bottom line, two or three generations hence. A broader, healthier link Now I see that all my life between these other worlds and the developed empire might well I've taken shortcuts- mean the empire's salvation. Yet it would seem to involve slow ! garden with a knife- ing down our progress and relative prosperity, for a time, to place ourselves in better shape for renewed efforts later on. but the Pacific Ocean offers no quick way WOULD GOVERNMENTS, business or even individuals in any great number choose consciously to slow down our progress in My tangles of concern this way, in the name of the hazy concept of 'longer-term pros are nets not meant for me. perity'? Self-interest is easily recognised in the short-term. Is it so easy to discern over the countless years of the future? The ques What I must do is row tion is not a new one. We might be best to leave one of greater and rest and marvel at the stars eloquence to muse upon it: until I feel a bump A being of the nature of man, endowed with the sa me faculties, but then the boat becomes a coffin with a longer measure of existence, would cast down a smile of pity made of leaves and contempt on the crimes and follies of human ambition, so eager, -Kate Llewellyn in a narrow span, to grasp at a precarious and short-lived enjoyment. It is thus that the experience of history exalts and enlarges the horizon of our intellectual view. In a composition of some days, in a perusal of some hours, six hundred years have rolled away, and the duration of a life or reign is contracted to a fleeting moment: The grave is ever beside the throne; the success of a criminal is almost instantly fol lowed by the loss of his prize; and our immortal reason survives and disdains the sixty phantoms of kings who have passed before our eyes, and faintly dwell in our remembrance. -Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. • Luke Fraser is a director in the federal public service. He lives and works in Canberra. 16 EUREKA STREET JU LY-AUGUST 2004 verse Ghazal What I Have Lost Its branches bloom with stars Great Grandfather's stamp collection As the tree laces the sky ... A gold sovereign The Milky Way watches the flowering of Mars My mother's silver bracelet (in a sand dune) As the tree laces the sky. Friends Watches galore Night's gift, children at dusk Som e hearing Surrounded by waves look calmly upwards. Opportunities In Russia, Taiwan and Uganda, it's free A brace of lovers All may watch even soldiers or Czars Several stone As the tree laces the sky. Parents A dinner set (at Central Station ) The moon, a ball stuck am ong branches. A husband Marvel as prison ers through branches of bars Luggage As the tree laces the sky Recipes My father' moth-eaten maroon woollen bathers Once, an owl swooped from this tree Teeth And m ade itself legend. Desire for revenge. Among the sm oke from cooking tagines, the scent of apricots, - Kate Llewellyn Saffron and lamb even in bazaars The tree laces the sky. Kate, beware of forgetting both work and heaven Hints rem ain while you sit drinking wine In a cafe called Escobars The tree laces the sky. -Kate Llewellyn JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 17 Dorothy Horsfield Women of Islam Dorothy Horsfield speaks to some articulate and revolutionary Islamic women I N CONV I B EU REK A STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 tenet of Islam,' she said, 'that God is closer to you than were encouraged as much as boys. Underlining their a jugular artery'. lives was the powerful belief that they were account Nevertheless for many in the room the suc able before God. cess of her campaign is part of a wind of change And bringing these women together for a 'dia across the region, from which they have benefited logue event' as the German Foreign Ministry's booklet against the odds. And beyond the niceties of con describes it, what exactly will that achieve? ference etiquette, there was also a firm acceptance The task force's Dr Guellil twists in her chair, folds of the importance of open discussion of brutality, her anns. 'Maybe nothing', she says. 'But then there is prejudice and the 'dark dingy tunnel' that mutual understanding, networking, friendships. These leads to equality for women. women are the role models for what comes next. And after this it is important that we try to support them L ouGH SIMILARLY OUTSPOKEN, journalist Raeda when they go back into their communities.' • Taha from the Palestinian territories had less reason for such hard won optimism. Like her Sudanese col Dorothy Horsfield is a writer and journalist currently league, she is a graduate from an American univer based in Berlin. Her most recent book is a memoir of sity. From the age of 21 she worked for seven years in her late husband, Paul Lyneham. Tunis as Yasser Arafat's press secretary and now runs her own business in Ramallah. 'As a child I twice visited East Germany as a PLO guest and was shocked to see such .~c a low wall', she said, 'the one c the Israelis have just built is oJ:J much higher. So is that a defi -~ ~ nition of developmentZ' c Seated beside Raeda Taha E"' Q:; at the large round conference lJ QJ table is Rana Ismail. She is a -E small pale woman in tradi 0 > tional dress. She is the head V> ~ ::> mistress of Lebanon's largest 0 Islamic school and also an u 2 electrical engineer, in a coun 0 ..c try which she says will soon Cl... have more female than male engineers. At 14 she was already working for an NGO and witnessed the Israeli seige of Beirut. In 1982 while still a teenager she was in one of the first International Red Cross convoys to enter the Sabra and Shan tala Palestin ian refugee camps to bury the piles of corpses from the Israeli massacres. Deeply religious and conservative, neverthe less, she too is a strong voice for women's rights and pointedly describes Lebanon as a tolerant multicul tural society. The challenge of her life, she says, is how to use her gifts to benefit others. And this is not possible without love, above all from her husband. This relationship is part of what has given her essential 'strength and support'. T LKI G TO sucH woMEN, listening to their stories, their lives seemed interwoven with common threads of experience. Well-educated and professional, many paid tribute to their strong mothers who refused to accept that obstacles could not be overcome. Most came from egalitarian, liberal families in which girls JULY-AUGUST 2004 EU REKA STR EET 19 po and mo lofty passions - Alexis de Tocqueville ~------Ph oto by Peter So lness/Australi an Pi cture Libra ry. ITSHOULD COME AS NO SURMUSE thM in environmental issues for a book I was to experience as a kid growing up around Peter Garrett has burst onto the party researching. Over more than an hour his the bush.' political scene amid controversy. It's not as fixity of purpose never wavered. Garrett's next lessons in respect if he's lived his adult public life as a wall For one raised as a carefree, suburban for nature came from surfing and the flower. The French historian and politician Sydney boy, Garrett is living an extraor excitement of interacting with what he Alexis de Tocqueville may well have under dinarily charged and committed life. He describes as 'a primordial energy'. stood the drive behind Peter Garrett. seem s to radiate moral principle, yet you For a radical, Garrett leads a stable per Garrett is a highly credentialled can feel he's fighting for our values. It takes a sonallife, most likely a result of his com didate, despite the messy details over certain bravery to match Garrett's force mitted Christianity. He studied Arts Law his irregular voting record. In addition to ful oratory. at ANU in the early 1970s, completing the both academically-earned and honorary Garrett grew up in West Pymble in the degree at UNSW, he married in 1985, and degrees, and the negotiating skills needed 1950s, his family living on a block of land has three children. Garrett resists attempts to head up the Australian Conservation abutting the Lane Cove National Park. to pry into his family life, drawing a clear Foundation, Garrett earlier showed the He remembers playing around the river, line between the personal and the public. discipline necessary to direct a rock band building rafts and dams, climbing trees, The public side of his life seems to have that aimed for commercial success and a and listening to the sounds of wildlife as been fully integrated, with music and credible social message. As he says, he's he lay in bed at night. environmental protests dovetailing into 'ready to come into the m ainstream '. 'I became aware that nature has a kind campaigns such as those to save Jabiluka I met Peter Garrett a few years ago when of presence, an atmosphere. I have no fear in the Kakadu National Pari<. he was the President of the Australian or loathing of lying on the ground, of get 'My story is of a gradual, accidental, Conservation Foundation. We had come ting down among the insects, and I know continual movement towards the place together to discuss his involvement the terrific freedom I was lucky enough and the people in my life now. It was one 20 EU REKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 decision after another, that we weren't on the grounds of ecologicat cultural and 'It's a mistake to think Australians are going to stand around any longer complain recreational value. not a spiritual people, that their spiritual ing about what we were doing to nature 'Australia is a broadly middle-class ity is not bound up with the land and the but, instead, try to do something about it.' country. One of its tragedies is that we natural environment. People still rate Midnight Oil started to do benefits for haven't secured agreement from the politi national parks and a holiday in a beautiful, Greenpeace and other organisations on cal parties to meaningfully look after the green, unspoilt place as highly valuable. issues such as protection for the Antarc natural ecosystems. We've achieved a very It's difficult to make simple statements tic and whales in the late 1970s and early qualified pale green approach, a problem about the complex responses people who 1980s. There was a link between the work compounded by living in a poll-driven sys live in urban environments have because the band was doing and its involvement tem within the context of a scientifically we're all faced with the way the world is in anti-nuclear campaigns and unarguable decline in the environment, and have to make the best of it. But all support for the Rainbow Warrior. such as in the state of the rivers. of us have the capacity to choose those 'Humans have always modified in some things we value.' G ARRETT STOOD FOR the Senate as a way their indigenous environment so to Garrett sees an overland family trips Nuclear Disarmament Party candidate in some extent the idea of a pure wilderness during the summer holidays, as a big part 1984 and although he was not elected he is a myth. Nevertheless the qualities inher of the Australian psyche. says the backing of green activists meant ent in nature- aesthetic, coherent and '"Where I part ways with some environ it was a tremendously successful public productive qualities- have been basic in mentalists is that I have never taken the campaign in terms of awareness-raising. forming human society and if we do away view that humans are the blight of the He says he was happy to act as a public with that, we're effectively consigning our earth ... we're giving the earth a beating, speaker on environmental issues in Tas selves to a nasty, brutish future. but we're also going to be the mania until his 'use-by date' ran out. 'There are significant reasons why we / ones that fix it up. 'I thought it would be an occasional need to care for the environment. Never thing but I found myself getting drawn mind how many satellites we have in I HATE THE HYPOCRISY of governments into the Lemonthyme campaign to the space, earth is the only fertile planet we paying lip service to the environment-in extent that eventually I accepted the invi know of and its fertility is not in a fixed making promises and then not keeping tation to become ACF President in 1989.' state and we're hacking off our own limbs them. The Natural Heritage Trust He returned to the position for a sec when we hack into the earth. So it has a program that came about as result of the ond term because he believed Australia's cosmological or spiritual component to sale of Telstra was clearly a political way environment had deteriorated rapidly in it. People are happier and feel in control of buying off the green vote. The Howard the five years since he'd left, particularly when they're inhabiting a natural envi Government had a great responsibility to with the Howard Government's 'totally ronment: I don't mean living in caves; I ensure that those monies went towards inadequate response to the worsening mean streets with trees putting out some real and significant environmental repair, problems'. oxygen to feed the brain.' and quite clearly that didn't happen.' 'It's a question of whether you buy into But how do you get through to the Garrett has a great admiration for the myth of continuing economic growth numbers men who make things world the late Nugget Coombs for his service and a wonderful future made out of ever 'You get through by doing what you to Australians in economics and admin increasing piles of concrete. We've never can within your own sphere of influence istration, particularly to 'the original bought into it. That's not to say we're in your own environment in your way Australians' in the latter part of his life. nihilists, but we think sustainability is a with your own skills ... And you don't give In 1992 Garrett gave a lecture on sensible word with a lot going for it and in. Individual citizens join up with other Coombs' life, referring to his modesty, it certainly offers more potential for crea individual citizens and create movements and the regard in which he was held by tive, meaningful human endeavour than and movements create change. leaders on both sides of politics, from unrestrained global growth-' 'We have to live in balance with the Menzies to Whitlam. He saw Coombs Garrett cites the campaign in 1989 to earth. We're torn between sensing this is as a public servant and adviser who was save Jervis Bay from becoming a major true and the idea that the consumerist prepared to speak his mind without fear or naval installation, as a model for envi dream is going to make the nation great. favour, citing his term as President of the ronmentalists. The campaign invol vee! It hasn't quite happened yet but society is ACF (1978-1980) as a period when it was local people, including Aboriginal groups, changing. unified and productive, and increased it working and middle-class Syclneysiclers 'The signs of it are that there was 'commitment to Aboriginal land rights'. with weekenders in the area, and national no shortage of environmental dialogue Clearly, for Garrett environmental and organisations. over the first 50 years of Federation but social issues are bound together. And for 'It was a multi-dimensional campaign. there was little represented in the public light relief there's always some hard rock I didn't have any personal attachment to domain. Now we've got environmental music in the background. • Jervis Bay but I'd been there, surfed along programs on radio and television, in pri the coast, and I thought the idea of a whole vate and public organisations, at locat Dr Christine Williams, is a Sydney-based Navy infrastructure, with bomb storage state and federal levels of government.' lecturer and writer. She is currently work facilities and a six-lane highway fairly A pragmatist, Garrett brings esoteric ing on a book on environmentalists, obscene, and that it should be countered theory down to earth. [email protected]. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 21 Peter Davis Operation 1n• progress Peter Davis examines progress on the road to peace in the Solomon Islands T,cu" ""' BH.N m Peter Davis is a writer, photographer and a senior lecturer in the school of Communications and Creative Arts at Deakin University. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STRE ET 23 Tony Ke vin Good advice, falling on deaf ears ? 1 THESE STRA GE H OWARD years duced the written submission thus: would reinforce adverse perceptions of where policy failures prevail, we have Australia in Asia. Through such a circular We [Ga rn aut and Carmichael[ write as become used to the sidelining of wisdom process, Australian sovereignty would be two Australians who have had substantial and experience of people like Malcolm diminished. involvement in Australia's trade liber Fraser, Paul Keating, former Department These were accurate predictions, alisation and in intern ational discussion of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) head well before the artificially confected of trade policy. An important lesson of our Richard Woolcott, and former Chief of the Tampa border security crisis, the experience is that the domestic process General Staff Peter Gration. attacks of September 1 I and Ba li, and th rough which trade liberalisa tion is dis A less well-known case is Professor Australia's i nscrtion into the cussed and trade policy decisions are taken Ross Garnaut, author of Th e East Asian US-led invasion of Iraq. is critica l to progress in liberalisi ng world A scendancy and visionary architect of trade. Disinterested analysis and wide dis the 1980s-1990s Hawke-Keating strategy ARNAUT STUCK STRI CTLY to econom semination of information about the costs G which locked Australia securely into the ics in his 3 May committee testimony. of protection was a criti cal clement in east Asian economic miracle. In summary, he debunked estimates persuading Australians that reducing our Garnaut is still a person of high stand claiming $5.6 billion annual benefits to barriers was in our own interest. ing in Asia, especially in China, and an Australia after a ten year period. Fully $4 ANU economics professor with a string Four years ago, when the idea of an billion of this was an estimated benefit of directorships. But these days he spends Australia- US FTA was first m ooted, from the FTA granting preferential higher more time than he hould working on his Garnaut (Straw Polls, Paper Money by exemption limits to US-sourced invest farm near Canberra. So far as the present David Love, Viking, 2001) warned qui m ents, under Australia's foreign invest government and DFAT are concerned, he etly that it raised real questions about m ent review mechanism. If that were the is pretty much old news. Australia's continued progress towards nature of the main benefit, a much greater Garnaut testified two months ago living in a productive relationship with benefit- up to $30 billion-would com e as a private citizen (also representing its east Asian environment. He said that from raising the exemption limit of the Bill Carmichael, former Chairman of talk of a discriminatory FTA with the US Foreign Investment Review Board fo r all the Industries Assistance ommission) was damaging. It could not be agreed to investment-source countries, or simply before the Joint Parliamentary Standing without significant concession, because abolishing the Board. ommittee on Treaties under its the US was just not in a position to accept The remaining $1 billion of claimed Australia-United States Free Trade free trade in agriculture. But the fact that trade benefits was similarly specious. The Agreement (FTA) reference. His testi it was being discussed at all would nega report on which the government relied mony on 3 May and supporting written tively affect perceptions of Australia in hastily amended after the US finally ruled submis ions were the most substantive Asia, at a time of the already damaging out Australia's anticipated trade creation arguments yet presented, from an overall 'deputy sheriff' affair. Talk of discrimina gains from improved access to US sugar, national interest viewpoint, against this tory free trade with the US compounded beef and dairy markets- actually showed proposed FTA. em erging problems for Australia in east in its data tables that under the final FTA, The Committee completed 11 public Asia, placing at risk important goodwill. trade diversion effects (bad) would exceed hearings on 14 May and was due to report In his understated way, Garnaut sug trade creation effects (good). to Parliament by 23 June. It is not clear gested to Love that 'we had put a lot of To explain, trade diversion is when what impact Garnaut's testimony, under effort into building som ething that was Australia, under pressure of a preferential reported in national m edia, may have. a bit different in Australia'. Deeper iden tariff, buys a higher-cost Toyota from the Garnaut's testimony was important, tification with America would change US instead of a lower-cost same-model discomfiting and sad. During the period of many of the things we liked about being Toyota from Asia. Trade creation is when the Howard Governm ent there has been Australian. At best, we would becom e a new US market is opened such as that such a lo s of Au tralia' formerly for second-rate Americans. Breakdown in for Australian sugar. If trade diversion midable expertise in international trade relations with other Asian countries [in outweighs trade creation, the long-term negotiations, that Garnaut, a committed 2000, Australia's relations with Indonesia dynamic effect on Australia's economic trade multilateralist, basically had to and Malaysia were glacial] would feed welfare is also negative. guide m embers of the committee through back into Australian fears, further driv Garnaut concluded that, judged as a International Economics 101. He intra- ing an orientation towards the US . This bilateral trade deal, the FTA had approxi- 24 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 mately zero net benefit to Australia. The was inadequate. Insufficient credence had fund strong legal challenges to our social economic modelling on which the govern been given to the consumer interest and policies and our sovereignty. Also-and ment relied had failed to pass 'the laugh the general national economic interest. Garnaut alluded to this-if such issues test'i an economic model that would not The process unduly weighted the voice of become elevated to questions of alliance make an economist who knows the real producers and exporters. (The Australian solidarity, will Australian governments world laugh. FTA negotiating team included the main have the strength to balance them? Such His political economy analysis was producer and exporter groups, and the has been Canada's experience of its trade even more arresting. In terms of the bulk of submissions and testimonies to agreement with the US-of constant, multilateral trade negotiating process, the committee came from such groups.) wearing-down, US corporate pressure, this FTA sent all the wrong signals to Garnaut argued that there was no need backed by US governments. Asia. Having accepted US exclusion of for Australia to rush its decision process Paul Kelly in The Australian has sug Australian sugar and disappointing beef before the Australian election, as the gested that opposition to the FTA comes and dairy outcomes, Australia in future US legislature was unlikely to fast-track from both multilateral free-traders and bilateral negotiations with large Asian the FTA before the US presidential elec from economic nationalists. His implica countries has no argument against them tion in November. In this, Garnaut may tion, if I understood it correctly, was that excluding industries they may wish to be wrong. It looks now as if the Bush this opposition was thereby in some way protect. Australia had sacrificed an impor administration may try to rush the deal weakened because it was self-contradic tant negotiating position here. through the US Congress. This may be tory. Actually, there is no contradiction This FTA also sent a strong signal Bush' s reward to Howard for Australia's between those positions. One may be an to the world that the multilateral Doha part1c1pation in Iraq. It may help economic nationalist in term s of want Round approach to international trade Howard's re-election chances if he can ing to try to protect Australian owner liberalisation was losing ground to bilat convince Australian electors that the FTA ship and social control over our limited eral FTA approaches. This has already will benefit Australia, though national resources, and a multilateralist influenced the negotiating stance of this is still a big 'if'. in seeing the best hope for doing so being other major players. Over the past four through upholding equitable multilateral years, Japan and China have moved away G ARNAUT MIGHT HAVE alluded in his global or regional trade, investment and from their previously preferred multi testimony (but did not) to a well-sourced environmental protection regimes where lateral approach in favour of a regional story by Christine Wallace, 'Bush rebuff small countries are not over bilateral approach. Australia has helped stunned negotiators', (The Australian, whelmed by large ones. drive this. 25 February 2004). Wallace reported that This was the heart of Garnaut's the Prime Minister (on broad political L ET ME GIVE GARNAUT the last word. argument. He pointed out that the east grounds) over-ruled the recommendation When Love asked for the optimum sce Asian trading region had already factored of Australia's professional trade negotiat nario for Australia's international policy Australia's four-year push for a discrimi ing team led by Trade Minister Mark settings, Garnaut replied: natory FTA with the US into its own Vaile, who wanted to walk away from Well, the good scenario is the one we trade policy development settings. The the final deal offered by the US team. thought we were on. That is, maintaining development of an east Asian economic Wallace's story, which has not been offi a good relationship with the US, remain community that excluded Australia was cially denied, will be a reference point for ing in the US alliance, unlike N ew Zea already well underway. For example, tariff future Australian historians. land, but independent of the usi building preferences now being given by east Asian Recently in Washington, US chief a relationship of quality with nations countries to south east Asian palm oil, trade negotiator Robert Zoellick praised in Asia-a relationship in which we are tropical fruit and vegetable producers are this deal in terms of its long-term export respected, in which we are a participant already disadvantaging Australia's com market-opening benefits to the US in regional affairs. peting export products including canola economy. This ought give Australian oil. If Australia is to preference Toyota legislators pause. The question now is, can the cars made in the US over Toyota cars Many Australian commentators Opposition parties which have the made in Asia, why should Asian countries opposed to this FTA have noted the majority in the Senate find the common not do the same to Australian exports? inclusion of obligatory review and resolve to block the legislation necessary Garnaut said that there is already a appeal procedures (which have hitherto to implement this FTA, until such time process of withdrawal into discriminatory been subject to Australian sovereign as Australian voters elect a new govern regional trade blocs. Australia as a world policy choice) like our pharmaceutical ment/ It may be a close-run thing. Get trader will be the loser. benefits scheme, quarantine matters, ready for a lot of government spin. • Garnaut suggested respectfully that intellectual and cultural property, ten or eleven days of parliamentary media ownership, even riparian water Tony Kevin is a visiting fellow at the committee hearings could not replace rights allocation. Everything that bears Research School of Pacific and Asian a thorough professional examination in potentially on trade may be ubject to Studies ANU, and a former Australian the Productivity Commission of the net review and appeal as part of the process diplomat 1968-98. He is the author of A benefits and costs to Australia of the pro obligations built into this FTA treatyi certain maritime incident: The sinking of posed FTA. The data provided by DFAT deep US corporate pockets may thereby SIEV X (Scribe, 2004). JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 25 books. I Gerard Brennan Future nation This country: A reconciled republic?, Mark McKenna UNSW Press, 2004. ISBN 0 868 40551 5, ltltl' $29.95 M AR K HAS CHOSEN an ausplClOus When we took what we call 'land' we took The rhetoric of the time saw time for the launch of his latest book what to them meant hearth, home, the Australians as a m ono-cultural, m ono This Country: A reconciled republic{ The source and locus of life, and everlas ting- ethnic community, but the Aboriginal Canberra launch by Gatjil Djerrkura and ness of spirit. At the same time it left each peoples of Australia were constitutionally this latmch straddle 3 June. That date is local band bereft of an essential constant ign ored. We did not achieve our national significant for This Country. It was the that made their plan and code of living and constitutional identity in unity with date in 1769 which brought Captain Cook intelligible. Particular pieces of territory, our Indigenous people. When we m oved to the South Seas to observe the transit of each a homeland, form ed part of a set of to a national Federation, sections 25, Venus and go on to claim this country-or constants without which no affiliation of 51(xxvi) and 127 [' In reckoning the num at least the eastern coast- for the Crown of any person to any other person, no link in bers of the people ... aboriginal natives Great Britain and Ireland. It is a date that the whole network of relationships, no part shall not be counted'] of the Constitution has som e significance for a republic, for it of the complex structure of social gro ups rem oved Aboriginal Australians from was on 3 June 1953 that, in this country, any longer had all its co-ordinates. What I the Constitutional radar screen. And so we received reports of the coronation of describe as 'homelessness', then, means that it remained until 1967 when the enfran Queen Elizabeth II. Queen Elizabeth and the Aborigines faced a kind of vertigo in Li v chised people of Australia voted to remove her heirs and successors 'in the sovereignty ing. They had no stable base of life; every the reference to Aboriginal people in sec of the United Kingdom ' are, by force of personal affiliation was lamed; every group tion 51(xxvi) and to delete section 127. the Imperial Commonwealth of Australia structure was put out of kilter; no social What explains this lengthy delay in Constitution Act, the m onarchs of this network had a point of fixture left . recognition ? Aboriginal society and culture country. And 3 June is significant for recon were, and traditional Aboriginal society and ciliation, for it was on that date in 1992 that This is the legacy of European settle culture are, so different from the society the judgm ent of the High Court in Mabo v ment. There are now only remote areas in and the culture of the West that it is not Queensland [No 2} was published. which Aboriginal Australians can perform surprising that it was not understood by But the title of the book does more than the cerem onies and discharge the duties European settlers and, indeed, is not well draw attention to a date. It is an evocative they owe to their country, and even in understood by most of us in the title, challenging us to define our concep those areas the pervasive culture of the Western tradition today. ti ons of the place where we are, the kind west has eroded the traditions and impaired of people we aspire to be and the type of the transmission of the sacred stories of I T WAS NOT UNDERSTOOD that Aboriginal government we favour. the Dreaming. We cannot contemplate people could share their country bu t would 'Country' is a term which resonates with a future without reconciliation between never reduce it into exclusive private pos all Australians. It is, says Mark McKerma 'a Australians of Aboriginal and Torres Strait session. In earlier times, if Aboriginal peo word that goes deeper than nation.' Islander descent and other Australians. As ple tried to share country which had been Do we love this land? Do we care for Sir William Deane observed: 'Where there granted to Europeans, the Europeans would its survival as the inland rivers dry, the old is no room for national pride or national treat the Aborigines as trespassers and the growth fo rests are clear felled and salt rises sham e about the past, there can be no Aborigines would treat the Europeans as as the water table sinks? Is sustainability national soul'. usurpers. Conflict was inevitable. N or was the key word in our plans for development At Federation and thereafter we boasted it understood that Aborigines would allow of energy supply, transport, housing and that we had a continent for a nation and a others the right to forage over their coun try, urbanisation? Country is a term that evokes nation for a continent. We were unique. so it is not surprising that they would for warm sentimen ts in all Australians, but it We shared no land boundaries; we had no age for cattle or sheep that were regarded does not always translate into action. It is a divisions of the kind which marked Britain as the property of Europeans. Nomadic term which evokes a deeper m eaning in the and Ireland. We achieved our national and Aborigines were unlikely to understand the m inds and hearts of Aboriginal Australians. constitutional identity and independ need for settlem ent of an agrarian society. It is the term which our Indigenous citizens ence without rebellion or civil war. The N or could an understanding of the social use to describe the land to which they people of the federating Colonies 'hum structure of the two societies be easily belong-not land as an integer of commerce bly relying on the blessing of Alm ighty appreciated. A nomadic Aborigine had no but land as a source of life. The significance God, agreed to unite in one indissoluble concept of saving possessions; of necessity, of country to Aboriginal Australians was Federal Commonwealth under the Crown each day was sufficient for itself and so eloquently described by the late Professor of Great Britain and Ireland'. We were the the Aborigine appeared to be wasteful and Bill Starmer in his 1968 Boyer Lectures lucky country that enjoyed the blessing of incapable of joining our Western society 'After the Dreaming': Almighty God. in a successful industrial and post-indus- 26 EU REKA STRE ET JU LY- AUG UST 2004 trial age. Aboriginal people have never Mark McKenna challenges us to take indefinitely, so if we made an exception been restricted to a nuclear family; their the journey as we move to a republican of beneficial laws for Aborigines or Torres obligation is to share what they have with form of government. He shows how the Strait Islanders, what would we do if, in members of a widely extended family. But movement towards reconciliation has the years to come, we need to make special Aboriginal society had the strength of a been quieted-by political diversion, by provision for Pacific Islanders whose homes deep spirituality and it has largely retained 'the fear of cultural difference' and, he are inundated by rising seas? that characteristic while Western society contends, by the timidity of a republican Of course, reconciliation would be has drifted more into mate- movem ent which treated advanced by the protection of Indigenous rialism and consumerism, reconciliation as a separate rights but reference to the complexities forgetful of the spiritual and issue when it should have of the statutes which currently protect the transcendent. Western embraced constitutional Aboriginal land rights shows that, in society could never under recognition of Aboriginal a pluralist society, no individual right stand the Aborigine who people and their right to can be protected without qualification. went walkabout to perform freedom from racial dis Moreover, no broad statement of principle his spiritual duties and crimination. will suffice to achieve reconciliation. A to join members of the He proposes a new variety of measures must be taken-some extended family gathered incentive and a new solu which prohibit conduct which is inimical for a ceremonial occasion. tion. Marry reconciliation to reconciliation, some which positively Each culture had an with the republic, each advance that objective. Take a current intrin ic logic but the logic movement giving vitality to issue: what can be done to diminish the of each was the converse of the other. Let reconciliation symptoms of despair-substance abuse and the other. And so the poli be an objective of the new violence-that blight all our communities cies of the Western society republic and let the republic and especially some Aboriginal communi were formed, the laws be sought as a means of ties? However we answer this question, enacted and the practices followed which achieving reconciliation. This is a heady we may not adopt a policy that diminishes were designed to bring about the mono-cul challenge and it deserves careful consid the power of government to assist those in tural community envisaged at Federation; eration. But I wonder about the wisdom of despair. policies to smooth the dying pillow of the the marriage of these two movements in But Mark McKenna does not seek to expected-to-disappear Aboriginal race; poli the context of constitutional amendment. achieve reconciliation simply by substantive cies to assimilate Indigenous Australians Two questions come to mind: one amendment of the Constitution. He would into the European way of living and think is practical, the other political. have Indigenous rights and Indigenous his ing; and policies to take children from their tory recognised as an element in an eloquent families so that they acquired Western E RST, THE PRACTICAL question. How preamble to a republican Constitution. He values. Policies which were tragic failures can constitutional amendment advance proposes a preamble which expresses three because they failed to acknowledge not only reconciliation? One section to which fundamental principles: the culture of the Indigenous Australians objection is rightly taken is section 25 ... if Constitutional recognition of Aboriginal but their very humanity. by the law of any State all persons of any people and freedom from racial discrimina In time the policy of compulsory race are disqualified from voting at elec tion; the values and principles of Australian abduction of children was abandoned and tions for the more numerous House of the democracy; and a commitment to care for an appreciation of the intrinsic strength of Parliament of the State, then, in reckoning the land and the Australian environment. the Aboriginal culture and tradition led to the number of the people of the State or of the realisation that Aboriginal Austral the Commonwealth, persons of the race This is a feasible proposal. It would ians would never be forcibly assimilated resident in that State shall not be counted]. acknowledge our history and identity, our into the Western culture or mainstream. It is offensive and obsolete. It should go but basic political values and our respect for Gradually, when Mr Whitlam poured the it changes nothing. Another provision is this country. As for reconciliation, a careful soil into the hands of Vincent Lingiari and section Sl(xxvi) which gives the Parliament wording of the first principle would permit Sir Edward Woodward's report was imple power to make laws with respect to 'the governments to work for reconciliation by m ented by Mr Viner and Mr Fraser and people of any race for whom it is deemed taking steps according to the needs of par the High Court delivered its judgments in necessary to make special laws'. Should ticular communities. The preamble could Mabo and Wik we came to recognise that it be removed? The Constitution does affirm a commitment to this country as the unoccupied Crown land was not Crown not contain a Bill of Rights; for the most 'core of my heart'. land but Aboriginal land- held by a fragile part, it simply distributes power between Is all this an empty symbolism ? I think title, it is true, but nonetheless Aboriginal the Commonwealth and the States and not. True symbols are the expression of land. Then there was the massive outpour among the Parliament, the Executive and our deepest values and the guideposts to ing of compassion when people marched the Judiciary. If the Constitution were to our actions. For too long in this country in their thousands to say 'sorry'. We have deny the power to make laws for the people have we been fearful of acknowledging the seen some great steps taken towards rec of a race and were to forbid racial discrimi grandeur of our environment, the cultural onciliation but a long distance is yet to be nation, a law could not be made to ben richness of our population, the vitality of traversed. efit only one race. A Constitution endures our next generation, the splendour of our JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 27 tradition of equality and tolerance. A new ing to what they see as the certainties of their unique and resilient culture and constitutional departure could celebrate the past. They may be in the minority on their occupation and custodianship of all these characteristics and dismiss the one issue or another, but if two or more the land, which celebrates our unity in narrow, fearful attitude that seems to rob issues are joined, the combined minori the diversity of all who make Australia us of our unity, our independence and our ties may be marshalled to make a m ajor home, which reaffirms our commitment national pride. It could be a liberating ity. We witnessed an alliance between to the rule of law and the system of repre stimulus to produce a free and confident monarchists and direct electionists in the sentative and responsible government and nation. But the preamble would have to most recent vote on the republic with a which is expressed to further the protec acknowledge not only the injustices of President elected by Parliament. So if we tion of our hom eland would be a powerful the past and our respect for Aboriginal wish to see changes in our Constitution statement of the character of our people tradition and culture; it would have to both a preamble and a republic- let the and society. To achieve reconciliation acknowledge our unity in the diversity of issues be separated into separate pieces among Indigenous and non-Indigenous the many peoples who have enriched the of legislation and permit each issue to be Australians and to adopt a Constitution Australia of today. The history and culture addressed by the electorate as it sees fit. for an Australian Republic would be to of modern Australia has roots not only That was the procedure favoured by the see our nation achieve its full maturity in this country or in Great Britain and Constitutional Commission in 1988 when and dignity. For those of us in the autum n Ireland; it has roots in Europe and Asia it drafted as many Bills as were needed to of our lives (or later), our hope is that our and the islands of the Pacific. If we move deal with the series of recommendations children and our children's children will to a republic, it must be a republic for all made for constitutional am endment. Else see such an Australia-an Australia recon Australians, a republic that celebrates our a coalition of the unwilling will defeat ciled, a republican Australia, a free and a unity in diversity and the mutual respect what would be a majority view on a dis confident nation. • of all sections of our multi-cultural, multi crete proposal. ethnic, multi-religious community. fur these reasons, I have reservations This is an edited text of Sir Gerard Brennan's N ow the second question: the politics. about Mark's thesis but not about his address at the launch of This Country on 8 Many Australians have been made fearful objective. A preamble which acknowl June 2004. Sir Gerard Brennan served on the of the future, troubled by change, cling- edges the first peoples of our nation and High Court of Australia from 1981 to 1998. encounter Morag Fraser Hands on I MAcwc AGRove m Aum.ti•n echool The principal, Helen Toohey css, is mak They tell me that they were aston girl s, clustered in the customs office of an ing tea, offering jellybeans, letting them ished most by the affection and interest international airport, their gear spilling all unpack the experience. with which they were met. These are about them, playing solitaire and joking Eight girls and three teachers from one cool young women. And with Australian with the local security police. Australian school took part in an experi teenage coolness goes a certain inhibition It's not the way travel goes these days. ment. Kilbreda College is a beachside of expectation. They don't expect other More usually it's a business of anxious Brigidine school and one-time con vent people to take them on, don't expect queues, searches, dogs sniffing, silent and in Mentone, Victoria, and this year it relationships to be built quickly. 'But the armed inspectors. But there was nothing celebrates 100 years of educating young things they said, they actually meant', one usual about this trip. And by the end, the women. But these girls and their three of them tells me. 'They'd say, "I send my girls were so inured to the unexpected teachers went away instead of staying love to your family", and they'd that they took what came and made a home and congratulating themselves. actually mean it.' feast of it. 'When we first arrived in Dili, They raised the money (degree of dif we wouldn't have dared even speak to a ficulty high ), and went to East Timor, to SOMET TMES THE GIRLS' reception was policeman', one of then tells me. 'Too the cities and out into the country. They formal and a little overwhelming. The hour scared. We'd heard so much about troubles visited schools, slept in dormitories, and-a-half ceremonial welcome in Ossu and violence. But by the end-well, it was played basketball and volleyball with astonished them . 'We were treated like just different.' local kids, spoke English, taught some, royalty.' They look astonished even now, Very different. I'm listening to them, a tried to learn Tetum. They watched the as though they are only just beginning to few days after their return, ga thered now reconciliation process in action. They met understand the rituals of a culture that in a formal, high-ceilinged room at school. children, politicians, teachers, bus drivers, takes hospitality seriously, and wondering It echoes a little as they all talk at once. policemen, and the odd celebrity. how much of it has rubbed off on them. 28 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 I m et these young women before they Indonesian teachers rem ained. They note, again. They are amazed at 'how beauti left fo r East Timor, and I listened to their as only school students can, the specific ful' East Timor is. Before they left they expectations, so it is intriguing to hear differen ces between what these children knew what they were going to do there. them now, less sure of themselves, though take with them to school and what they Som ething like good works-not a phrase far m ore knowledgable, than before. They are accustom ed to lugging along. In East they'd use. But none of them anticipated seem surprised, shocked almost, to have Timor the basic textbooks are there but the degree to which the country been so liked, so accepted. They went there is 'none of our usual paraphernalia'. would act on them, gratis. with good intentions, but have com e N ecessities or luxuries? And they observe hom e more grateful than satisfied. differences in attitude. 'You could really L EY PLAY BASKETBALL and volleyball. Som etimes the interest and the sudden see these kids working hard.' The contrast The trip was originally conceived in part intimacies generated out of concentrated with attitudes back h ome is unspoken, as an exchange of sporting skills, and experience had their comical side, and but implied. They don't look chastened the girls come armed with gifts, includ they loved it. 'How m any children are you but they do seem puzzled, as if poised for ing guitar strings, dress up dolls made going to have?' they were asked, often . If som e shift in the way they understand and at school, and sporting equipment. But the answer was the predictable Australian deal with their own lot. do they dominate on the fi eld? Well, 'In one-'Oh, one or two probably', they w ere They notice too, a culture that seems basketball we did fine', but volleyball- 'a told, 'No, have twenty.' Much hilarity at home in its religion. Som e of the m ost bit of a problem'. So much of a problem and strenuous refusals. But then they saw interesting people they m eet are reli that by the end, their driver, Marcus, who many villages in which extended families, gious- the Bishop of Bacau for instance. speaks no English, can m anage a fluent up to 18 or m ore, all slept in the one tiny Bishops don't much figure in their daily 'Volleyball, no good?' and barracks for the house, the cooking done outside, and most lives in Melbourne. Australians, out of desperate solidarity. of the living too. So the question-'h ow While in East Timor they swim and While they are there, Australia and m any children ?'-acquired a context . play and talk but they also visit some of East Timor become embroiled in rancor They saw how the economics and support the prisons and torture cells that speak ous arguments over territorial rights to structures worked. They saw also the way of the recent past and the violence of the rich energy reserves in the Timor Sea. village culture is being played out in the Indonesia's occupation. 'The solitary con Accusations of exploitation from the East reconciliation process. They saw how finement cells-they are really creepy.' Timorese government are countered by East Timorese have to get together, how They search for words. 'Exorcise', one righteousness in Canberra. On the ground people who were the aggressors of them says. in Dili there are signs of a different kind. and people who were the victims Another m en Leading up to Independence celebrations, must now sit together on the mat tions Port Arthur. the girls visit the Aloia Foundation, set that has been the traditional place It's as though up by the Australian wife of Xanana for sorting out differences. something has Gusmao, Kirsty Sword. They see how They are also surprised, con to be cleansed, it promotes wom en's health and craft. fused even, by the complexity and because they They come home wearing the Tais woven of the sociopolitical culture. In have been there, by the women, and they have their own Ossu, while they are being cer inside the places experience of the kind of linkage between em onially welcomed, they hear where brutal acts Australia and East Timor schools that the East Timorese students acknowl were committed, Aloia Foundation promotes. edge, indeed thank, Indonesian they feel the need Finally, just before the Independence teachers for the part they played to be cleansed fireworks begin, they go to a concert and in their education. Then they too. East Timor hear Paul Kelly sing. His support act is have to sort that with the fa ct exacts a price Peter Garrett. The Paul Kelly song the girls that, after Independence, only two from them . reprise to m e in the echoing Kilbreda room But it gives is 'From little things big things grow.' They them boundless figure it was sung expressly for them . • and unexpected pleasures as well. Some of it is Morag Fraser is an adjunct professor in the sublin1ely simple: swim Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences ming out to the coral at La Trobe University. She was a student reef at Bacau ('Almost at Kilbreda during its half-century celebra too idyllic. I thought, "I tions. can't believe I'm here".') Or playing with children. The eight girls were Camille Ravesi, One day they run am ok Angie Stuart, Tracey-Anne Collins, in the rice stacks with Bridget O'Brien, Laura Bartholom eusz, a bunch of young East Caitlin Wood, Amanda Sheppard and Timorese. And become Jess Wilson . The teachers were Michelle children themselves Moore, Joanne King and Mary Stack. Images of East Ti mor from the photos of the Kil breda students. JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 29 the world . .! Anthony Ham The sons of privilege Anthony Ham travels the enigmati c and affluent Sa ud i Arabia ing him one of the m ost miserabl e and dejected figures I have ever encountered. Soon after m y arrival in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, I travel north into the conservative Islamic heartland of the Najd . Here, local tribes consider themselves to possess the purest aristocratic Arab blood, and to be the most faithful custodians of Islam 's legacy. En route to Buraydah, Saudi Arabia's most conservative city where even Western women must be veiled and Saudi security forces are in a constant battle against al Qaeda militants, we pass the turn-off to the sm all oasis of Al-Uyaynah. It was here that, in 1703, Mohammed ibn Abd al Wahhab was born. His family origins were mod est, his family pious but poor. With little means of 1 T H E PLUSH subsistence in his village, al-Wahhab left to travel PUBLIC SPAC ES of the region as a religious student, passing through Dubai International Mecca, Medina, Basra and Hasa before returning Airport, wealthy to Al-Uyaynah to preach a puritanical message Saudi m en swagger calling for the purifica tion of Islam and a return to through the con- the religion's 7th-century roots. courses in pristine white robes, fingering their prayer The village sheikhs tolerated al-Wahhab for as beads absent-mindedly while veiled women trail long as it took for him to beat those who didn't par behind in robes of black. ticipate in communal prayers and to lead the ston As night approaches, clusters of Pakistani m en ing of a woman accused of adultery. Al-Wahhab was with henna-dyed beards stretch out on the carpet to expelled from the village, but his message found a sleep, blocking walkways. Harassed and be-suited ready audience in the surrounding communities. airport officials with walkie-talkies, pass by at the Further north, I pass the night in another Najdi head of two long, orderly lines of Asian women, like village. As I settle down for the night, reclining teachers escorting children on a school trip. Outside, on cushions in a Bedouin tent, I am joined by where departure gates announce destinations includ some m en from the village. Hamdi is gentle and ing Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam, the women queue hospitable, deferentially asking questions about separately, divided from the men and from the people the West and showing me photos of his time in of wealthier nations. London. He can no longer return because Saudi Less than an hour later, high over the Rub al passports have become obj ects of suspicion. Khali, the Empty Quarter, the bright lights of Dubai Another, Mohammed, is a genial man who wants already seem a distant m em ory. Saudi Arabia is me to know that he loves George W. Bush obscured by clouds. The cabin has fa llen quiet. and what he is doing in Iraq. The silence is broken by a cowed and whispering Bangladeshi man. He asks if I will fi ll out his Saudi L E VILLAGE SHEIKH, a man of 80 who wears arrivals card. He is illiterate and speaks neither Eng stunning robes of black with gold embroidery, learns lish nor Arabic. He has been to Saudi Arabia before, that a Westerner is in town and invites me to a village many tim es. I help as best I can and he is grateful, feas t. He speaks little but fills the room with his perhaps m ore so for the fact that he is returning to a presence; a personal gravitas that inspires reverence job offering wages which he could never earn in Bang am ong the villagers. His brother similarly presents ladesh. He shuffles away, the anxiety of his alienation himself with the nobility of royal blood, smiling etched on his face and bowing, his demeanour m ak- easily and often, plying me with questions which 30 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 suggest a genuine curiosity for the world: What is knows, but each day he works to secure their future. Australia like? What are the main industries? Why He would go home more often but his employers, who have you come to Saudi Arabia? What is your opinion hold Azeem's passport while he is in Saudi Arabia, of my country? You are welcome, guest. only allow him one week's annual holiday. His daily Before dinner, I am seated next to the sheikh takings are around US$55, but US$15 goes to petrol who distributes gifts to the men of the village, who and up to US$35 must be given to his employer for smile and talk and ensure that I am comfortable. the privilege of employing him. Still, he says, he could Great columns of smoky incense fill the room and tea never earn that kind of money back home. and coffee and dates are distributed. When we eat, the In the early 18th century, it was in Dir'aiyah, sheikh tears off the choicest cuts of lamb and hands now a mud-brick ruin some 60km from Al-Uyaynah, them to me, imploring me to eat more. A flat screen that Mohammed ibn al-Wahhab sought refuge after TV in the next room broadcasts Al-Jazeera's being expelled from the village of his birth. Moham coverage from Iraq. med ibn al-Saud, the local sheikh who ruled just 100 houses, was at that time seeking to distinguish his A FTER THE MEAL, a sheikh from a neighbouring rule from the countless other sheikhs of the Najd, village arrives, full of his own importance and with seeking a status which a bearing which little resembles the discretion and only some form of doc dignity of my host. The newcomer announces that all trinal Islamic legiti of his sons studied in America but he ordered them to macy could bestow. return to Saudi Arabia lest they be corrupted by the Similarly, Al-Wahhab ways of America. 'The Americans and their friends are had come to under criminals', he concludes with a look around the room stand that the success to make sure he has been heard. Some of the young of his reforms required men nod, others look embarrassed. Unexpectedly, he the backing of a politi shakes my hand warmly when he leaves, wishing me cal authority capable of a pleasant stay in Saudi Arabia. ensuring his protection. The following morning, I leave for Riyadh. As Wahhabi Islam I depart the village, I realise that I have not seen a quickly became the single woman for the entire 24 hours of my stay. ruling ideology in Back in the capital, I take a taxi driven by Dir'aiyah and, in Azeem, a gentle, bearded Pakistani. As the chaos 1744, Mohammed ibn of fast-moving American Cadillacs and SUVs swirl Abd al-Wahhab and perilously around us with frightening speed, Azeem Mohammed ibn al-Saud exudes a calm, weary serenity. He takes me past pledged an alliance. The a girls' school, outside of which young Saudi men agreement's grand aim cruise by in their shiny cars. In this land of strict was to extend Saudi segregation, they throw from their windows scraps of Wahhabi authority paper containing their mobile phone numbers in the over the entire Arabian hope of later receiving a call. Peninsula. Under the Azeem drives me to Dir'aiyah, just outside Riy terms of the agreement, adh. On the way, he speaks of his family. He has been which was founded on in Saudi Arabia for 13 years, returning home to Islam the twin pillars of piety abad for two weeks every two years. He has six chil and patronage, Al-Saud dren, born at two-year intervals and whom he scarcely assumed the position of imam, the political leader of the Muslim community to whom tribute must be paid. Al-Wahhab became the religious leader, authorised to rule on all matters of Islamic inter pretation. In Riyadh, the new capital of the Al-Sauds, Azeem takes me to the mud-brick Masmak For tress, one of the few vestiges of Old Riyadh. In its door is lodged a spearhead from 15 January 1902, the day on which the Al-Sauds finally took con trol of Riyadh. Not far away from the fortress stands the Great Mosque which overlooks the open area known by expats as 'Chop Chop Square'-it is here that public beheadings are still carried out. Also on the square is the headquarters of the JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 31 a Muslim nation from the same country as the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. The most obvious expression of this was the anger of al Qaeda- Osama bin Laden is a Saudi by birth and 19 of the 23 hijackers on September 11 were Saudi citizens. Behind it all, Wah habi Islam has become a byword for militant and deeply conserva tive Sunni Islam, an orthodoxy so powerful that, 14 centuries later, it still holds sway in the '"r kingdom . .1. HE TENSIONS WITHIN Saudi Arabia and increasing attacks on Western interests reflect the fact that the home of Islam is a deeply troubled land, a kingdom riven with contradictions. This is a land governed by the precepts of 7th-cen tury Islam, mu'tawwa (religious ruled by a dynastic family whose power derives from police) of the Commit the 18th century, and which together form a fabulously tee for the Prevention wealthy nation propelled into the 21st century by oil of Vice and the Propa wealth and state-of-the-art technology. This is a kingdom ga tion of Virtue, the which is home to some eight million expatriate workers guardians of Islamic and which annually welcomes millions of pilgrims, yet it orthodoxy. It is their remains largely closed and unknown to the outside world. job to tear contro Deeply traditional and historically insular to the point of versial subjects from paranoia when confronted by those who wished to enter international newspa Arabia, Saudi Arabia has been propelled into the future pers before they go on without shedding its past-a nation at odds with itself and sale, to ensure that all the world. businesses close during Modern and moderate Saudis have long called for prayer time five times greater political freedom and pushing for greater recogni a day, that women tion of the rights of women, arguing that their nation will are appropriately cov only survive by building bridges to the West. Conserva ered and that men and tive Saudis wish to tear such bridges down, decrying them women do not mingle. as offensive for a kingdom whose leader holds the title as Since the 18th cen 'Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques'. tury in the Najd, and The job of reconciling the m any strands of Saudi soci from its base in Riyadh ety is hugely complex, one which the Saudi rulers seem no since the early 20th closer to resolving. Theirs is an unenviable task. Moves century, the Saudi towards greater liberalisation continually fo under on the Wahhabi alliance has always gained its greatest strength from fact that Islam not only casts an all-encompassing shadow confronting the threats posed to Islamic purity. More often over modern Saudi Arabia. It is indeed the country's reason than not, foreigners have been the target, uniting the faith for existence and the very reason that the Al-Sauds hold ful through their un-Islamic ways. Some 260 years aft er the power. fusion of Saudi political power and Wahhabi religious agree On my last day in Riyadh I m eet Mahesh, an Indian from ment was signed, it is this sam e suspicion of outsiders which Kerala who is counting the days until he can leave Saudi Ara fuels the forces that threaten to tear the kingdom apart. bia. He is here out of necessity, a symbol of the kingdom's When Saudi Arabia permitted the United States to launch perennially suspicious relationship with the outside world. its war on Iraq from Saudi territory in 1991, it was a fateful I ask him what he thinks of the Saudis. He doesn't answer, step. The decision to allow the presence of US and other for other than with a smile that resembles a grimace. There is no eign troops on the kingdom's soil brought to the fore the long doubt that the feeling is mutual. • simmering discontent throughout the Muslim world about non-Muslims operating so openly and aggressively against Anthony Ham is a freelance writer and photographer. 32 EU RE KA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 Bruce Duncan Rome and the bush Bruce Duncan looks at the role of the church fol lowing the war in Iraq I RAQ MAY TECHNKALLY hm JULY- AUGU ST 2004 EU RE KA STR EET 33 Alison Aprhys Gone surf\n' Alison Aprhys finds out why catching a wave is so catching about surfing that keeps drawing us back? It's 6am, somewhere on the Australian coast. While you're snugly asleep, I've pulled on a jumper and am sipping a much needed coffee, standing on a balcony, atop a sand dune or a beach front car park, silently wait ing for first light. We're on dawn patrol and our mission is to get our daily wave fix. As the stars fade and the dark slides into dawn, we spy the lines rolling in. As one, everyone sculls their coffee and sprints for their car. There's a mad scramble into wetsuits, boards are waxed and we pelt down the sand. Surfing deftly cuts across any gaps in age, gender, political leaning or socio-demo graphic placement. Out there no-one cares about your bank balance, post code or waist size. Surfing is our solace, addiction and pas sion. That moment where you stop paddling, the instant you jump up and standing on your board, swoop down the glass-like face, across the unbroken wave ... nothing comes Peter de Monchaux at dawn. close. Not every surfer started as a grommet and continued surfing all their life. Some have reclaimed their former love after years pursuing relationships, career, educa 'LOOK OUT soN', c•lled out'" oldn sude< on' miny tion, travel or a combination thereof. Others have recently winter's day at Bells Beach, as he took off on a wave we were discovered for themselves what surfing offers and how it both paddling to catch. Five years ago, clad in a thick men's lifts their spirits and heart to a new plane. Many found that XS wetsuit which flattened any curves, booties and with my after a youth of riding hard and fast on shortboards, that age hair newly cut short, I probably did resemble a teenage boy. and arthritis mean they now enjoy the fun and But as he paddled back, I corrected him, saying 'Excuse me freedom that longboards offer. sir, I am a girl', which caused much hooting and laughter from the frozen surfers sitting around waiting for a wave, S oMETIMES THE JOURNEY of surfing isn't so much measured keeping their hands warm by clasping them under their rub in miles, but in years. Like a mermaid, Sybil Walsh drifts in berised armpits. the ocean, her long silver hair floating against a dark green sea. Chatting as we all bobbed up and down, they revealed As soon as she feels the swell, Sybil is paddling hard to catch an interesting cross-section: musicians and mothers, plumb the wave and wham! Next moment she is in the power pocket ers and lawyers, retirees, surf-shop workers and office of the curl and bodysurfing towards the beach. This extremely managers. Some were newer to surfing than others, but all fit and energetic 60-something reclaimed her love of the ocean were sufficiently keen to have left their homes complete some nine years ago after a 30-year absence. 'I finally reached with fireplaces and footy on the TV to make the trek out the stage in life where I was able to follow my love of the water', to catch a few waves at an otherwise deserted beach on a she says. Seemingly impervious to the cold, Sybil disdains the glacial Sunday afternoon. Listening to their remarks about surfer's cold weather friend, proving that saltwater runs in her waves ridden and wipeouts taken, I was struck anew by how blood. A hardy soul, Sybil chooses to paddle, swim or bodysurf enthused they all were and I started wondering just what it year round in just her swimmers. is about surfing that grabs our hearts and souls? What is it 'Wetsuitsz I call them wimp suits', she laughs. 'I don't feel 34 EUREKA STREET j U LY- AUGUST 2004 the cold.' Last January, Sybil bought an old wavcski and can be agrees Robert 'Bobby' Furness. 'I've made some wonderful seen most dawns, lugging her board from her car roof-rack to friends in the surf'. Bobby's life revolves around the waves; the foreshore. not only does he get wet as often as he can; he also runs the 'The ocean is my addiction, I love swimming and seeing surf concession on the Channel island of Jersey, explaining all the beautiful dolphins, fish, seaweed and feeling a part that Jersey's predilection for a 40ft tidal range can limit surf of this wonderful place', she says. Sybil recalls her love of ing on smaller tides. 'I didn't take up surfing until the '70s deep-sea fishing off the cliffs north of Point Perpendicular at when I moved to Jersey to teach PE and coach rugby', he the entrance to Jervi Bay with her father, a search master says. A former rugby player for Wales and world champion with the Royal Volunteer Coastal Patrol. She agrees that the triathlete, Bobby came to Sydney for the Rugby World Cup ocean has its own lure. last year and ended up staying a few extra months to escape 'It's just so inspiring out here, I'm just going to keep Jersey's chill and enjoy the Australian summer. A contem bodysurfing and paddling as long as I can', she says. porary of Ray Moran, they finally met a couple of months Somewhere on the northern beaches of Sydney, a freez ago, although each had met and surfed with mutual friends ing westerly slowly turns hands and feet to ice. Shivering, some 30 years earlier, when som e of Ray's fellow Australian Peter de Monchaux runs into the water, giving a small sigh lifesavers made their annual winter pilgrimage to the UK of relief. during the short European summer. Like Ray, Bobby lives for 'The water feels hot in comparison to the wind chill', the surf, no matter how cold. 'Surfing changed my life for the he says, jumping onto a wave. 'People don't realise that better', he says. 'I couldn't do without it now'. it's so much warmer in the water than on the beach'. Like Roaring Beach has definitely lived up to its name. lots of 40-somethings, Peter loved surfing as a teenager and Walking up the dunes after enjoying a cold morning' waves he's come back to it, as addicted as ever after an extended amidst the dolphins on the south-east of Tasmania, we listen break spent developing his career as a music teacher to some surfers ahead. They are in raptures. 'Beautiful day', and raising a young family. Unlike his contemporaries, says one, craning his head for one last glimpse of the ocean. he's not surfing a fibreglass glass longboard-in fact he's 'Yeah, some great waves', says his friend. They laugh and not surfing a fibreglass board at all. He's become capti continue their conversation to the car park, where shivering vated riding a 'five foot foamy'; the light-weight boards tourists, scowling at the leaden skies and the freezing wind used by grommets and surf life saving clubs Australia seem oblivious to the wild beauty the beach has to offer. As wide and he regularly surprises people with his skill. we pass by, their expressions clearly indicate they think we 'Getting a wave every day is essential to staying are mad. sane', says Peter. Perhaps that's what sets surfers apart; surfing allows us to see more clearly not just ourselves, but also the beautiful D ow THE BEACH, Ray Moran clearly remembers watch world around us. It's not just the fun we have, but riding the ing Midget Farelly and Phyllis O'Donnell win the world waves ignites the saltwater in our veins. • surfing championships in 1964. He recalls the heady days he spent surfing pristine South African waves with his mates in Alison Aprhys is a surf writer and photojournalist for the late 1960s and early '70s. newspapers and magazines in Australia and the US. 'No wetsuits, lots of sharks and we lived on fruit and wheatgerm to save money', he says with a grin. 'It was tre mendous fun'. A popular local identity around the Manly SLSC, Ray combines his role as board captain and managing their extensive archives between attend ing surfing festival up and down the coast. A lifelong surfer who was one of the first to surf the northern NSW break of Angowrie, Ray gets out pretty much every day; a familiar sight in his yellow boardshorts, knee paddling his beloved longboards. Woe betide any grommet who mistakes his white hair and laugh ter lines as indicators he's past his best surfing day ! He considers age a badge of honour and on the fickle beach breaks, Ray regularly shows the younger surfers what traditional stylish longboarding is all about. 'Couldn't live without it', says Ray smiling. 'There's nothing better than surfing', JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EU REKA STREET 35 Dewi Anggraeni Volatile democracy The forthcoming pres idential electi ons 1n Indones ia are certa in to surprise. INTHe LAST YEAR OR so, mention ol rationale being the cliched, 'better the Susilo Bam bang Yudhoyono, former Min Indonesia in Australia generally arouses devil you know'. ister for Security and Defence, won 7.5 images of hardline Muslims involved in It is possible that the successive and per cent, and the Prosperous Justice Party, regional terrorism. It may be interest easy victories of Suharto and his Golkar a party evolved from a basically small ing to take another look, especially as Party during 32 years, in retrospect, may fundamentalist Muslim party, Indonesia is making further inroads not be entirely attributed to the govern Justice Party, 7.3 per cent. toward democracy this year, with a par ment's bullying tactics. There must have liamentary election and a presidential been a degree of acquiescence, if not DEMO CRATIC PARTY was effec election. inertia, on the part of the majority of the tively founded in 2001 to serve as Yud Until 1999, elections in Indone people. hoyono's political stead, because Indo sia had been a big yawn, because of The chances for success for new par nesia's electoral law specifies that only their glaring predictability. After 32 ties therefore, are usually abysmal, unless political parties can nominate presiden years of Suharto's iron rule, Indone they have ready-made support, such as tial candidates. Even on the eve of the sia's first democratic election in 1999 Amien Rais' PAN in 1999, which drew April election people were still speculat was marked by euphoria, optimism and much strength from Muhammadiyah, the ing that the Democratic Party might not promise of massive reform. second biggest Muslim organisation in the receive the minimum electoral support Five years on, and much disap country. required by law, (three per cent), in order pointment later, Indonesia faces an For this reason the emergence in to nominate a presidential candidate. even tougher test. Not only were the the April 2004 election of two new par However Yudhoyono's supporters were results of the April parliamentary elec ties with little previous record and no not too worried, because they were sure tion full of surprises, the first direct apparent existing support base, is phe that their candidate would be 'adopted' presidential election to be conducted nomenal. by one of the major parties, who would on 5 July, promises unprecedented The Democratic Party, co-founded by undoubtedly recognise what an asset he suspense. had become. Many observers were caught To their delight, the Democratic by surprise with the results of Party won 7.5 per cent of the vote and the parliamentary election. While became one of the big seven which won they had expected a reduction of 41 per cent of the vote in total. The support for incumbent president remaining votes were distributed among Megawati Sukarnopu tri's party, 17 smaller parties, few of which won PDIP, very few had predicted the more than three per cent of the vote in extent to which people abandoned their own right. it. The votes the party received The surprise effected by the Pros plummeted to 18 .5 per cent, from perous Justice Party was not as strong 34 per cent in the 1999 election, as that of the Democratic Party. Those the largest number of votes won by disillusioned by PAN, which started off any individual party at that time. as a party which embraced Muslim intel Voters expressed their disap lectuals and moderates, but evolved into a pointment in the current govern watered-down and vague political entity, m ent, who they believe failed to found a natural home in the new Prosper deliver promised reform, and had ous Justice Party. brought the country's economy Golkar attracted the highest propor into disarray. tion of votes at 21 .6 per cent. This figure It was expected that in spite of is only slightly lower than that of the 1999 rowdy protests and demonstrations 6 election. Instead of losing support like against the government, that vot PDIP, Golkar has consolidated its force. ers would ultimately support it, the Another major surprise for observ- 16 EUREKA STR EET JULY- AUGUST 2004 ers in Indonesia was the nomination of body of social and media monitors who Phillip Rapoza to review an arrest warrant Wiranto by Golkar as its presidential are not reluctant in exposing any wrong against Wiranto which Rapoza had issued candidate at their convention in late doings or injustices committed by those on 10 May. Rapoza subsequently rejected April. Most people had expected Akbar in power. the bid. It has become clear that even East Tandjung, the party President and Speaker It appears that Golkar is both Timor is thinking of softening its blows. of the Lower House, to be nominated. ered more by the fact Akbar Tandjung All this has not been lost on observers in Admittedly Tandjung's name was some had been convicted of corruption than Indonesia. what tainted when he was convicted of by charges of human rights violations Advocates of human rights in Indo corruption last year, though the convic against Wiranto. The anti-corruption nesia have yet to 'naturalise' the con tion was later overturned by the appeals drive is one of the three major issues cept. For those who live below the pov court. On the other hand, Wiranto has with which Indonesians are currently erty line, bullied each day by local thugs been charged by a UN-backed tribunal in concerned, the others being improve while law enforcers turn a blind eye, the East Timor, with having ultimate respon ments to education and reviving the econ notion of human rights is unfortunately sibility for murder, deportation and omy. Even Wiranto's staunchest rival, too abstract. Hearing that a former gen persecution 'committed in the context Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, eral, whose looks and public speeches do of widespread and system atic attacks declared clean governance his not invoke fear in them , is involved in on the civilian population' during East ""{X T priority if elected. human rights violations, only invokes Timor's transition to independence from disbelief. This is especially so when Indonesia in 1999. vv AVES OF PROTESTS against the the alleged crimes were committed in a After its defeat in the 1999 elec 'return of militarism' in Indonesia rise and remote place; and as far as many people tion, where PDIP amassed nearly 34 per fall in big cities, especially in Java. Though are concerned, if they do not see the act cent of the votes, Golkar has undoubt both Wiranto and Yudhoyono are retired, them selves or hear fro m som eone close edly regrouped. In fact, Golkar does not the protests appear directed at Wiranto, as to them, it rem ains hearsay. appear to have really lost its support in Yudhoyono is seen as a 'reformist' among Even som e of the more educated have the outer islands, especially in Sulawesi. the military. problems with the issue. Their objection Against this background, lies in the selectivity of the international the significant disillusion concern. If the world is so concerned ment against Megawati's about human rights, how come they are government has worked in only outraged about violations in East Golkar's favour. The only Timor and West Papua? What about what other government in the is happening within Indonesia? It is not collective mem ory of the hard to see how easy it is to insinuate that country's population is that the West's preferential concern is influ of Golkar. And when people enced by the dominance of Christianity in are uncertain where the next East Timor and West Papua. meal will come from or when Five presidential candidates and their it will come, greater political respective running mates are now regis freedom is cold comfort. The tered fo r the July election. The strongest memory of Golkar's regi are Yudhoyono, Wiranto and the incum mented government suddenly bent president Megawati. In the case of no looks a lot more attractive, General Wiranto campaigning in Malang, East java in june 2004, clear majority, a second round of elections especially when its excesses © AAP/APflri snad i. will be held on 20 September. no longer loom large in its Direct presidential elections are country's consciousness. To most intellectuals and many in entirely new in Indonesia, and it is no Golkar m ay have been draconian, the political elite, Wiranto is a political secret that it is causing a great deal of corrupt and nepotistic, but people embarrassment, because of his alleged confusion on the part of the voting pub rem ember that at least they had regular actions in East Timor. However people lic. Much horse-trading has been evident m eals, clothes to wear and som ewhere are gradually resigning them selves to the among the political elite. However with to sleep. fact that he m ay indeed win the presi international monitors present and the A noted scholar and political dential contest. The concern that this relentless m edia observation, it is less observer once likened the country to a may alienate Indonesia from the West easy to sustain accusations of vote-rigging milking cow. During Suharto's rule, a quickly faded when the US indicated that and electoral irregularities. At best, those small elite milked it and fed it. Under if Wiranto were elected they would work who do not like the elected president can Megawati, the cow is milked by every with him. If the pattern of the last eight say that the voting public are yet to be body and nobody bothers to feed it. years were to be used as a barometer, this properly educated. • It is also worth noting that the suggests that Australia would not protest present Golkar is different to that of too much either. Then on 11 May, East Dewi Anggraeni is the Australian corre Suharto. It is aware of a changed atmos Timor's Prosecutor General, Longuihos spondent for Tempo news magazine, and phere, where there is a solid, albeit small, Monteiro, asked the UN-backed Judge regular contributor to The Jakarta Post. JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 37 Don Gazzard A tale of two cities INTHE SAME WA> th" it helps to hm what m ust have been an enonnous and I visited and the place had a monastic, read Pushkin and Gogol to understand complex brief of requirements into this cloistered feeling of being removed the present day Russian Czar and his deceptively simple arrangement from the world, an oasis for quiet study. bureaucracy, the grand new public librar T he site is dominated by four L-shaped The visual scale of the towers has been ies opened in London and Paris at the end 20-storey glass towers, one on each corner reduced by extra large sheets of special fire of the millennium say something about containing some offices but mostly the rated, laminated safety glass, and timber the differences in their cities, their histo book stacks. When seen from a distance screens are used inside the glass to protect ries and the societies that built them. Old the towers are so far apart that, although the books from the sun. But the arrange habits and traditions die hard. obviously related in some way, it is hard ment certainly seems contrary and the to grasp that they are all part of one building has not been without criticism building. They are often described locally, both for its moonscape appearance as resembling open books (why do and the unprotected way one enters the people always seek such simple building, up and over a windswept plaza. symbolisml) and they sit on an The practical working of the place, in enormous open plaza. This plaza particular the retrieval of books from the is the roof of a six-storey building stacks has also attracted criticism. which covers the whole site and The contrast between its austere grey has a long narrow central courtyard exterior and the rich materials and col patterned on the Palais Royale ours of the minimalist interiors, and the and containing mature trees. This rectangular podium is sunken into the ground however, so it is only a storey above the surrounding Th e British Library showing the piazza and Sir Eduardo streets. N o entrance is visible as Pao lozzi's statu e of Isaac Newton. © Irene Rhoden. you approach and there is no sense of the im m ense size of this buried The TGB, la Tres Grande Bibliotheque, base. You enter by ascending a continuous or the Very Big Library to use its common flight of wooden stairs around the building name, (officially called the Bibliotheque up onto the vast elevated podium at tree Nationale de France), was the last of Fran top level. cois Mitterand's Grand Projets, his most Most commentators have described ambitious, civic, political and cultural the appearance of the building as gesture, clearly designed to bolster French Orwellian, even pharaonic, because of its prestige and the importance of Paris. T he enormous empty heroic scale and I must library is on the left bank of the Seine in admit the Ministry of Truth also came to a run down area of to the east of the Care m ind. It has also been described as having d'Austerlitz, and the project was con grandeur and m onumentality, and being sciously conceived as a stimulus to the at the sam e time forbidding and exciting. urban renewal of the unfashionable 13' An other critic suggests that with cheap arrondissem ent. It rem ains to be seen if looking office towers the new library this library building does becom e a cata seem s more like a business com plex than lyst in this way or whether it will stand as a civic m onument. a fo lly of political ambition. From the open plaza you descend via Boldly Parisian in scale, the new escalators at each end of the building library covers an area as big as the Place into rich and interesting interiors. And de la Concorde, a breathtakingly simple all the reading room s, special librar composition that is quite perverse in ies and research rooms open off and its organisation with the readers below look back into the enclosed landscaped ground and the books above. The architect courtyard, to which curiously there is no Dominique Perrault has skilfully distilled access. It was a dull autumn day when The Briti sh Library's entrance hall. © Irene Rhoden. 38 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 opposition of the busy city outside and the land next to St Pancras Station in 1976 but all too seldom consciously addressed. sunken cloister inside is impressive and for a third scheme but construction didn't The organic form is innate; it shapes as it intriguing. Baron Haussmann would have commence until 1982. In his book about develops from within, and the fullness of approved of both its size and ambition. It the library Sandy Wilson complains that its development is one and the same with is all very Gallic, only the French would 'no other project in Britain since the the perfection of its outward form. Such is have the courage to make such a confident building of St Paul's Cathedral (which the life, such is the form. yet wayward gesture so in scale also took 36 years to reach completion) is Unlike the hard-line modernist obsession with the city of the Sun King. comparable in timescale or the magnitude with 'Progress' this tradition never sought of controversy surrounding it'- to cut itself off from the past or deny itself L E NEW BRITISH LIBRARY next to Inevitably architectural design is allusion to precedent and always retained a St Pancras Station in North London compromised by such a lengthy process blood relationship with painting, sculpture has replaced the circular reading room of stopping and starting, changing clients and hand-crafts in an age increasingly com attached to the British Museum. Since and constant amendment. It is a truism mitted to mechanical reproduction. 1753 the Museum library had housed one that great architecture not only needs a of the finest manuscript and book col good architect, it also needs a good client; This brave inside-out approach is lections in the world until overcrowding both are rare and the combination is even m ore difficult to pull off than the big forced parts of the collection to be housed rarer. It is hard to appreciate the position king hit approach of the TGB, although elsewhere. Karl Marx wrote Das Kapital of the architect and his 30-year travail, both of course depend on the skill of under its dome, and the reading room has and the creative energy needed to keep the architect. In the best hands the been home to m any famous writers. A enthusiasm and creativity alive over that symbolic approach can look inevitable n ew library was first proposed in the early length of time. and right-one can't imagine it any '60s and was finally commissioned by Act The British approach could of Parliament in 1972 but it then took not be m ore different than that of almost 30 years befo re it was completed, the French. Perrault hit on a big a classic story of government bumbling, abstract concept (put the books stop-start financing and Sir Humphrey in four 'open book' towers and like machinations. This is a great contrast sink the reading rooms into the with the French situation; despite public ground) and then cram everything criticism Perrault had unflinch in to m ake it work functionally. ing political and financial support, Symbolic forms and ideas were and his building was completed in imposed upon the situation. ten years. Wilson claims to have a The first design for a n ew more organic approach, working British library was prepared in outwards from the brief of require 1962 by Sir Leslie Martin and ments without any preconceived Colin St John Wilson on a site ideas and letting the building further down Great Russell become 'what the building wants Bibliotheque Nationale de France. Photo: A lain Gousta rd . Street from the Museum. It to be', to quote the poetic US Architect: Dominique Perrault © ADAGP 2004. wove itself into the Bloomsbury architect Louis Kahn. Wilson, who context by incorporating St is very historically aware, has been Georges Church and Georgian strongly influenced by what he calls the different- but more often it produces terraces into the overall sch em e; 'Other Tradition' of Modernism , archi buildings that simply seem wilful and all very English. Martin was a tects like Aalto, Scharoun, Asplund, even arbitrary. The organic approach has pro distinguished architect who had Frank Lloyd Wright. He is worth quoting duced masterpieces like Aalto's town hall been h ead of the London County at length on his approach: complex at Saynatsalo, but in the wrong Council's Architects Branch in hands can simply look gauche In designing the British Library building its post-war hey- day, an organisa and dyslexic. we have drawn widely upon this tradition tion that built som e of the best not only in the adoption of organic fo rms schools and public housing in the INEVITABLE that buildings like that are responsive to growth and change world until it was abolished by these will n eed to expand and change dur but also in the repertoire of sensuous Margaret Thatcher as a socialist ing their use. Experien ce shows that it is materials that are particularly responsive abomination. usually difficult to alter and expand the to human presence and touch- leather, The scheme m et strong opposi former without destroying the concept wood and bronze. We touch, hear and tion from conservation groups. By but is less difficult with the m ore bro smell a building as much as we see it and the early '70s Martin had retired ken and complex forms of organic build furthermore what we do see in terms of so Wilson prepared a second ings. Financial constraints dictated that weight and texture, density or transpar smaller scheme in Bloom sbury the library be built in stages (only Stage I ency transmits explicit resonances of a which also met opposition. So has been completed) and Wilson sees the body language that is common to us all the government acquired railway freedom to deal with future changes as a JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 39 virtue of his approach. an over-the-top red brick Gothic Revival more glassy, that it was 'a very British Wilson appreciates the modern building, masterpiece to some and the institution'. dilemm a about the symbolic role of a butt of ridicule by Modernist orthodoxy. Those words sum it up. Everything library clearly and embodied it in the A similar red brick was chosen for the about it, the architectural approach (the incorporation of the Kings Library. It was library both to work with its surround abstract approach doesn't quite fit with a condition of the gift to the nation of the ings and because in Wilson's opinion British pragmatism does it?) the political great book collection of George III that brick is the one material that improves suspicion of professionals, the concern its beautiful leather and vellum bindings in appearance over time in London. The about the urban context and the choice of should be on show to the general public and vertical arrangement of the library was materials is very British. The building suf not just scholars. The collection has there largely conditioned by the importance fers because all the basic design decisions fore been housed in a central free-standing Wilson attaches to incorporating natural were made 25 years ago and the uncertain structure inside the building, an object in light wherever possible, and as a conse political support and lack of consistent its own right, a six-storey high bronze and quence the reading rooms are located at financial support have taken their toll. If glass tower that can be seen from the top of the building under a variety of it had been built then, it would by now many parts of the interior. Aalto-like roof forms to admit daylight. be a well-loved, if eccentric, building. As a consequence the book stacks are in Although the interiors arc impressive, it LEBRITISH LIBRARY is the kind of the basements where they have the most now it looks curiously out of time for a building where the inside and the outside stable environmental conditions. new building, a bit old fas hioned, yet it must be understood together, externally it Reactions to this building vary widely. sits in its fussy North London context seems like a large building trying to look I appreciate the integrity of Wilson's with assurance. smaller. The main body of the library has approach after years of post-Modernism How interesting to reflect on the been set back from its main road frontage and fake facades attached to m ean build differences in approach of these two build 'in order to create an enclosed courtyard to ings. And I approve of its incorporation ings and how they reflect the political and m ediate between the turmoil of the traffic of natural light and its approach to the intellectual cultures of the two countries. and the entry into the building'. importance of natural materials that age Vive I' differen ce ! • The urban context was also im portant gracefully. One UK critic concluded by as the library's main neighbour is Sir Giles saying that w hile some might have wished Don Gazzard is an architect who works in Gilbert Scott's 1867 St Pancras Hotel, the British Library to be more modern and both Sydney and Melbourne. THE AGE The Age Melbourne Writers' Festival MELBOURNE wriTers' 20-29 August, 2004 FESTIVAL Australia's premier literary event - The Age Melbourne Writers' Festival will take place from August 20 to 29, 2004 at the CUB Malthouse, the Melbourne Town Hall and other venues around Melbourne. Lynne Truss, the renowned author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves; celebrated Irish novelist, Calm Toibin ; from Sweden, Henning Mankell; and world acclaimed crime writer, Michael Connelly, head a stellar li st of writers who will be participating in The 2004 Age Melbourne Writers' Fe stival. Also coming to Australia for the festival this year are award winning French novelist, The official festival Philippe Claudel; publishing sensation, Carlos program will be released Ruis Zafon ; David Denby from the US ; Kenyan in The Age on Saturday author Aidan Hartley; Chinese/ US writer Xinran 17 July, 2004. Xue and British publisher Toby Eady. To subscribe to the festival mailing list and Among the Australian authors attending will be have a copy posted to Lynne Truss Peter Carnley, Helen Garner, Robert Dessaix, you please contact the Edmund Campion, Peter Goldsworthy, Peter festival office. M1chae! Connelly Tel: (03) 9645 9244 Singer, Frank Moorhouse, Frank Brennan, E-mail: [email protected] Matthew Reilly, Rodney Hal l, Peter Hill, Amanda Lohrey and many more .. . www.mwf.com.au 40 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 hool·s2 Matthew Lamb Rhythm of life Percussion, Jay Verney. University of Queensland Press, 2004. ISBN 0 702 23449 4, ItiU' $22.95 IN<994, )AY V >RN JULY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 41 Philip H arvey City terraces Carlton: A History edited by Peter Yu le. Melbourne University Press, 2004. I~BN 0 522 85061 8, RRP $59.95 L mNG m CARCTON in the bte '70• m eant teenage de.ites later made it a second home found climactic expression and bohemian tendencies went for anyone who studied there. troppo. A rented terrace with seven residents, and a floating It was only the crash of the population of 70 times seven, was an unequalled domestic 1890s that changed this affluent adventure. 'Floating' was in fa ct the word, with a daily intake progress. of legal and illegal substances causing the population to see the Many of those who cohab great omphalos in the ceiling rose, or a Canning Street rounda ited in cottages of glorious bout. Ganja plants lined the concrete backyard, or were culti squalor in the 1970s became vated by ultra-violet light under the staircase: the only things in the ones w ho yuppified the the house given careful tending. Washing-up? What's that l We place ten years later. Yet, that ran alternative shows on the nascent 3RRR. There was a high gentrification saved Carlton demand for sensory overload. Concrete poems built fr om Real is a myth debunked here, as it Estate sections decorated the walls. Philip Hunter was imitat becom es quickly apparent that ing Tapies in one room, Paul Grabowsky copying Bud Powell in the immigrant population after another. Weekends were one long jazz rehearsal. Parties were World War I, especially Italians and Jews, settled Carlton dur immovable feasts as guests took half an hour to find their way ing an era when it was judged a slum by the rest of Melbourne. from front door to fridge. Culinary skills extended about as far That, and the heroic actions of the Carlton Association in pro as over-peppered spaghetti Bolognese. tecting large parts of the Victorian heritage from the predatory We never thought we were making memories, but this Housing Commission demolishers, are the main rea- book reminds us we were one small story in decades of change. sons for its preservation. As Arnold Zable says, 'from the outset Carlton has been on a roller-coaster ride of booms and busts.' This most lavi h of sOME OF THE M OST PERSONAL and effective work here local histories is full of surprises. Three closely-written pages covers the Jewish and Italian times, the period circa the explain how Carlton got its name. Nobody knows, the closest Olympic Games being identified as when 'olives and pasta plausible reason amidst a labyrinth of guesses, being that the dura replaced pickles and rye bread in Carlton'. The tremen Carlton Gardens, established in 1852, lent the name to the sur dous social and cultural change brought to inner Melbourne, rounding bushland by simple mind association. especially by the Italians, is everywhere apparent today. So An attempt is made to piece together Koori history, though much so that it seems to have eclipsed the work of that other 'Carlton is not known to have had any particular significance group of boat people, who nowadays go by the exotic hybrid to the Wurundjeri' and we mainly learn how the people were 'Anglo-Celt'- a term they themselves would have met with di spersed or assimilated. In fact one conclusion drawn by Don disdain, or worse. For it is the Anglo-Celts who, despite Chambers is that Carlton was 'probably associated with death building and inhabiting Carlton for its entire existence, are and mourning' by the Indigenous inhabitants, as their people shadows in their own history. We learn about churches, busi were buried in the new Melbourne General Cemetery, in the nesses, and the picturesque shorthand of local politics, but section 'Other Denominations'. The presence in the bush of their absence grows greater as the text proceeds. The editor the Collingwood Stockade on what is now Lee Street School, apologises for the omission, confessing more work has to be would not have been a friendly sight either. done, but gives no satisfactory explanation. Vincent Buckley's The truth about Carlton is that it's unavoidable, geograph long poem 'Golden Builders' is a virtual reconstruction of ically, culturally, collectively. It's often seen as an extension Carlton as a place to which Melburnians are cloven and cleft. of the city of Melbourne. To get anywhere north of the Yarra, (It names so many Carlton streets that Michael Cathcart once Carlton must enter consciousness. A range of topical chapters called the poem the alternate Melways.) No such memory goes a good way in delineating how this happened. Carlton of long-term ancestral commitment can be found in these began late, really after the gold rush, which meant expansive pages, or picked up quickly, even though it is easy to revel use of space, whether for essential services like the brewery, or in the general scene. We spot the connections-Cardigan marvellous eminences such as the Exhibition Buildings. Classy Street and the Charge of the Light Brigade-but not always housing and broad streets rose up beside factories and hospi the deeper m eanings. Ray Lawler, who set his paragon play tals. Its symbiotic relationship with Melbourne University there, described it as 'a now scruffy but once fashionable 42 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 suburb'- The word 'fashionable' is used comfortably by many chapter tables the triumphs of the suburb's football club, contributors to set the 19th century picture, yet the book the Blues. Blues and melancholy are exact synonyms in itself provides few personal glimpses, giving impressions the Collingwood lexicon, the 1970 Grand Final being fairly of some mythic otherworld, exact details of which are now certainly the most brilliant comeback in the history of the lost. What we can see are the results: polychrome terraces, game, a spectacular victory over the archrivals that has ferny wrought iron, and squares of tree colonnades. But was powerful undercurrents for both clubs to this day. Glory it all just business as usual, carried out by men with well-cut and catastrophe. Sport though is but one small aspect in a beards? This lack of a longer memory may indicate a failure diverse, changeable history. Bill Garner's chapter on the thea of imagination. The scruffy second half of Carlton's tre explosion, and its ultimate implosion, is heartfelt. The life is in the foreground. chapter on crime carefully charts shifting causes and effects. And the section on the built environment is simply drooly for L rs ALSO INDICAT ES another truth about Carlton: it is a anyone who has lived there for any time; bluestone lanes are place people left as better opportunity arose. The Skips went forever part of the central nervous system. deeper into their verdant suburbs; the Jews crossed the river The book is rich. It covers a lot of country in urbane and into Balaclava; the Italians sought something so simple as particular style. It need not be repeated. It's good value. That bigger gardens for their vegetables and grapes. Carlton's said, the book leaves certain avenues open, some already stated, overall population steadily declined from 1945 to 1995, sign and there is one especially. Tightly edited oral histories dot the that for much of its history Carlton was a place to arrive at, text, but they dwindle. The time is ripe for a full-scale oral his then move on from. Even our own studen t micro-history of tory of this and other inner Melbourne areas, especially with a the late ' 70s bears this out. The owners suddenly wanted to new fierce phase in thoughtless re-development. 'In every nook sell the house. Romances turned into arguments. Personality and corner previously unoccupied, frail buildings are being run intruded on personal relations. It got messy. By the time the up ... in lanes and alleys, and on little patches heretofore used household broke up it was time to get a job or return to study. as yards and garden plots, miserable cribs are being erected for We were kicked off the radio on the grounds the jazz show human occupation.' This is not a recent letter to The Age but a sounded like a party. It's true, it was a party; Carlton gave report in the Melbourne Argus of 1868. • permission to party all night and we left without regrets. For this reviewer, a Magpie barracker, the most irksome Philip Harvey is Poetry Editor of Eureka Street . I wish to join Friends of Eureka Street as a: 0 Member $100 per year 0 Student Member $'10 per year Friends of Eureka Street Patron In corporating membership, a year's subscription and a donation that will go directly towards a scholarship for two young writers. 0 Bronze $200 0 Silver $300 0 Gold $500 First name Would you like to support youni writers? I Would you like to support Eureka Street on a higher leuel? ~S~"'="m=.======~ The Friends of Eureka Street program will give two young writers a $1000 scholarship, which will allow them to write for Eureka Street for Street Name a year. State Postcode Your contribution and membership in the program will give them a unique opportunity to write for Australia's leading journal of public I affairs, theology and the arts. IF,o~.,=ti m~• "~'''=cph=o,=c• N~o .======~,~.~~E m=,;~l ======~~ Friends of Eureka Street can choose to be involved as members ($100 : 0 I enclose a cheque/money order 0 please de bit my cred it ca rd per year), student members ($40 per year), or you can become a for $ __ made paya bl e to for$ Friends of Eureka Street patron (Bronze: $200, Silver: $300 or Gold: Friends of Eureka Street $500) : 0 Ba nkcard 0 VISA 0 Ma stercard Membership will include a range of benefits, and will be an I I I I II I I I II I I I I ,------,11---,--1 --,---, 1 I opportunity to support Eureka Street. ·IC"dho ld oc".o•m• I Fo r further information visit www.eurekastreet.com.au, call (03) 9'127 7311 or email e u [email protected]~.au Or fil l in your details and sen d to: Friend s of Eureka Street, ''"j""' l Reply Paid 553, Richmond VIC 3121. JULY- AUGU ST 2004 EUREKA STREET 43 I , Gary Pearce Irish dignity Lady Gregory's Toothbrush, Colin T6ibin. Pi cador, 2003. J ~BN 0 ;);)0 41993 5, RRP $22 A TTH' TURN of the 20th centmy, L•dy Augmto G.egmy radical nationalist incitements against the landlords. emerged as a key figure within the Irish Literary Revival. She T6ibin recognises that 'inconsistencies are part of the was a major organiser of the theatre movement, a founder of history of Ireland in these years'. Gregory's combination of the Abbey Theatre, and an important translator and dramatist conservative and radical viewpoints was connected, in part, in her own right. In Lady Gregory's Toothbrush Irish novelist to the intense strains within Irish culture and society itself. Colm T6ibin provides us with an evocative sketch It is a bit odd, then, that T6ibin of this complex figure. seems not to give broader pres Gregory was born into the Anglo-Irish landlord sures much determining force, class, rulers by inheritance who were under increas veering instead towards the sug ing pressure from an emergent Catholic middle class gestion that Gregory behaved and an indigenous nationalist movement. Inherited with some degree of personal rule is suggested by her marriage to Sir William bad faith. H e would have it that Gregory, an Irish landowner, former British Cabinet Lady Greg~ry's Gregory was not prone to much minister and former Governor General of Ceylon. self-reflection and that she An interest in more illicit alignments is perhaps Toothbrush displayed considerable skills in suggested by her early affair with the prominent managing contradiction. Missing anti-imperialist campaigner and poet, Wilfred certainly is any sense of a per Scawen Blunt. sonal, artistic or political struggle In the decade following Sir William's death with her inherited position. in 1892, Gregory edited his autobiography, which T6ibin observes that even as T6ibin regards as a key moment in her own emer she joined the ranks of the rebels gence and self-invention. The Anglo-Irish image she seemed hardly to have moved and ethos that she drew upon emphasised the much beyond the old friendships traditionalist relation between landlord and tenant and associations. Indeed, she with its attendant duties and responsibilities. This called upon such connections to tie between the Anglo-Irish and the native Irish was lend support to the formation of important in m ediating the tension between her rul the Abbey Theatre. T6ibin also ing inheritance and her increasing interest in Irish argues that the reason she did nationalism. It was an ideology that would also inform the not press her claim to joint authorship of the play Cathleen political and poetic vision of W.B. Yeats. Ni Houlihan was because its call for nationalist insurrec Gregory would later take some satisfaction in recalling tion threatened these older associations. Another sidewards that there were no evictions from Sir William's estate at Coole glance at other areas of her life at this time sees her threaten during the famine. T6ibin notes the elision here: Sir William ing to seize the cattle of tenants for non-payment of rents. lent his name to the infamous 'Gregory clause.' an amendment T6ibin acknowledges Gregory's determination and to the Poor Law requiring the famine stricken to abandon passion. Her powers of organisation and direction were even the most meagre land leases before receiving relief. Sir instrumental in establishing the Abbey. (He does observe William's personal enlightenment and benevolence proved a touch of the feudal in her dealings with support no guarantee against participating in government policy that ers and actors.) Gregory also defended artistic freedom caused great suffering and distress. against the formidable line-up of the Catholic Church, During the 1890s, Gregory learns the Irish language, the British administration, and other nationalists. She studies Irish history and literature, visits the Aran Islands and ensured some of the key works of 20th-century Irish collects Irish folklore. Under the radicalising influence of the theatre by Synge, Shaw and O'Casey first saw the Gaelic League, she undertakes a translation of the Cuchulain light of the Dublin day. myth, partly in answer to the Trinity University professors who argued that there was little of value in indigenous literature. As I T rs ARGUABLY Gregory's and Yeats' defences of artistic T6ibin also notes, the cultural nationalism underpinning all freedom against narrower forms of Irish nationalism that this ethnographic and literary activity did not prevent her from provided their most important intervention in Irish cultural maintaining her position and estate at Coole, or being aghast at debate of the period. T6ibin notes the obvious key moment: 44 EUREKA STRE ET JULY-AUGUST 2004 the riot against the Abbey performance of Synge's The The least convincing m oment in the book comes when Playboy of the Western World. The play offended the pieties T6ibin has Gregory m eet Eamon de Valera, veteran of the and idealisations of religious and nationalist forces, caus 1916 Uprising, head of various Irish governments and ing them to come together in unruly protest. T6ibin might subsequent President of Ireland. De Valera's politics were have drawn attention here to extreme sensitivity of cultural famously grounded in idealised images of a frugal and self questions within Irish society during these years. What he sufficient peasantry. T6ibin remarks: 'The ideology on which mostly identifies, however, was how readily Gregory and Yeats he based his politics was essentially hers, but without her reverted to Anglo-Irish type: Gregory apparently characterised liberalism and her belief in aristocracy, and, because it was this as a conflict 'between those who use a tooth politics, ready to accept failure.' These are large exceptions, brush and those who don't'. but T6ibin does not allow this to deter him from suggesting a very strong continuity between Gregory and the ideology ITIS INTERESTING THAT Gregory helped the young James that informed Dev's blinkered theocratic state. Joyce, despite 'his intermittent use of a toothbrush'. And T6ibin's m editation on Gregory's life and work is fre yet, Gregory's basic lack of empathy for the Catholic middle quently interesting and insightful, even if he sometimes class world of Joyce's writing meant that their relationship displays a peculiar lack of sympathy for his subject. H e would be cautious at best. Joyce, for his part, was not beyond skilfully weaves the key moments of her life into a cultural 'biting the hand' and penned some rude comments about her narrative of this important period. What is only occasionally in reviews and letters. Recent criticism has begun exploring evident, however, is the way Yeats' and Gregory's associa Joyce's complex relationship with the Literary Revival, in tion with a basically residual world was complicated by a which Yeats and Gregory played such a pivotal role. This is forward-looking cultural vision. Gregory will continue to something T6ibin hints at but leaves undeveloped. interest us because she was part of a cultural formation that Not surprisingly, some of the tensions in Gregory's posi staged what some now identify as 'resistance theatre', and tion come to the fore with the drama tic years of the 1916 beyond that, signalled the arrival of the uniquely important Irish Uprising and World War I. After an initially negative Irish contribution to 20th-century modernism. • reaction to the Rising she comes to perceive its symbolic importance and urges Yeats to do likewise. When he writes Dr Gary Pearce is a librarian at RMIT University. 'Easter 1916' Gregory has second thoughts and uses her considerable influence on him to delay its publication by some years. This influence is also evident in Yeats' remarkable sequence of poems to commemorate Gregory's son, Robert, killed while serving with the Royal Flying Corps. Na I'M veR'i SORe YOUR. HAN\Si6R The titles of two of the best known of these reveal D\D Nor &l'tJo~ HIS vrsrr lo a tension between Robert's apparent English patri otism and his Irish origins: 'In Memory of Major ''1H£ MINI \l~pooR \Ct.. R\t'lK'' f Robert Gregory' and 'An Irish Airman Foresees His Death'. After the formation of the Irish Free State in 1922, Yeats and Gregory sought official status (and subsidy) for the Abbey. This brought new pressures, such as those ranged against the staging of Sean O'Casey's The Plough and the Stars because of the offence it would cause to public opinion. To their credit, Yeats and Gregory defended the right to cause such offence and riots occurred once again at the performance of an Abbey play. T6ibin notes the imperiousness of Yeats' response, but also marks it as an important victory against what was to prove to be an extremely censorious Irish state. The Abbey underwent a slow decline in the subsequent years and decades. Rejection of O'Casey's The Silver Ta ssie, because of its expres sionist aspects, evidenced a failure to keep up with European developments in theatre: 'They had supervised one theatrical revolution; they were not ready to pay attention to another'. A new generation of playwrights, including those like Denis Johnston, would look to the newly founded Gate Theatre instead. JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EURE KA STREET 45 Matthew Lamb Not easy being green Memo for a Saner World, Bob Brown. Pengu in, 2004. J'> B N 0 143 00034 9, JutP $24.95 1 CO ULD BE ARGUED that most with discussion of some of the issues Wedn esday and spend the rest of their politicians enter public life with the best on the way'. These campaigns include time polluting every conversation with intentions. But such intentions are soon the Franklin River blockade, the log scare stories about holes in the ozone sacrificed to party expediency, narrow ging of both Farmhouse Creek and the Ia yer and the greenhouse eff ect'. In the self-interest, and short term political Styx Valley, and more. As a senator for sam e essay- where he argues, 'We are the goals. Here, the politician hopes the the Greens, he discusses the need for universe thinking'- he risks playing into public won't notice they've given up strong human rights and environmen such stereotypes. And yes, he does also working for the common good, that they tal protection laws, reflects on how include an essay about global warming, act only to keep the public distracted the Greens behave in government, and holes in the ozon e, and the greenhouse by relying on a form of sleight-of-hand exposes the violence directed against eff ect. Faced with this, it is possible to resulting from the separation of words environmentalists in Australi a see how som e would react by withdraw from deeds. and around the world. ing into their fears and pre ju dices. It therefore says a lot about Australia's All interest groups-and t he Greens democracy, when a person like Bob Brown EVEN I NCLUD ES an interesting are no exception- have their own expres is seen as a political anomaly, rather than essay regarding the consequences of his sions and their own language. T h is works the norm. For over two decades Brown interj ection of George W. Bush's parlia well for groups who arc not in terested in has been shaping his political mettle by mentary address in O ctober 2003: this communica ting with anyone outside bringing his words and actions into closer exercise in fr ee speech came after Bu sh's their own areas of interest, such as gov accord, trying to protect our long- term earlier visit to Manila, where fi ve oppo ernment and big business. But this does national and global interests, oft en at per sition m embers walked out rather than not work well fo r groups whose interests sonal expense. be lectured by the President without extend beyond itself and its own imme A cynic could argue that he can afford the right to repl y or question. Following diate m embers, such as those concerned to behave the way Brown and Kerry N et with humanity and the environment. he does because, not tle's actions in Aus The challenge, if such groups w ish to being in a major party, tralia, Bush's planned remain relevant, is to create a new la n with all its pressures address to the British guage which ca n connect with these and responsibilities, parliam ent was aban other, som etimes opposing, sometimes he has the least to doned, for fear t hat, complem entary, groups . lose. But to argue this em.boldened by such Bob Brown is m ost persuasive when would be to m iss the di splays of dem oc he avoids using a 'green' rhetoric, which point, and that is that racy, dissenting Brit he occasionally slips into, especially Bob Brown behaves ish MPs opposing when attacking m arket fu ndamen talis m the way he docs out the war in Iraq would and excessive m ateria lism. His best of necessity; solely protest . m oments, and happily these comprise the because he- along What causes m ost bulk of his book, arc when he effecti vely with everybody else concern about Bob uses against them the language of actually has the m ost Brown, however, is those opposers, and dcm ostrates t hat to lose. that som e of the lan a good econom y is dependent on good It is this point guage he uses, both in ecology; that narrow self-interest is that Brown is trying these essays and else ultimately self-defeating, and that a to convey in h is lat where, m ay appear broader con ception of h uman interest, est book, Memo for a counte rpro du ctive. com mon to all, is not onl y possible, Sa ner World. 'It con In the opening piece, but necessary. sists of stories fr om 'Earth Spirit', he cites It is a pity that Bob Browns don't grow along the road I have an Irish correspond on trees. • taken ', he says, in t he introduction, 'as ent and anti-environmentalist, who sees an environmental ca mpaigner con cerned all greenies as 'chunky-sweatered fo lk Matthew Lamb has a PhD in Literature. fo r all humanity and as a G reens senator, who ramble at weekends, hug trees on He lives and writes in Bri sbane. 46 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 l S<-;,1\ . Bri an D oyle On taking to the bed Refuge, retreat and redemption E tmm THL ME TACE" of the wom•n confusion and the second time to think Before the law arrived I had been sent in Mayo who took to the bed for three through a tottering marriage. Something by women to the top of the booth, to years, and the man in Donegal who took about the rectangularity of the bed, per remonstrate and persuade and dissuade, to the bed for a year, and the cousin of a haps, or supinity, or silence, or timeless but after climbing up and listening to my friend who takes to the bed every win ness; for when you are in bed but friend explain himself I felt that he had a ter when the rains begin. I am reminded not asleep there is no time, as good point, so I clambered back down to of Darby Ruadh of Aughinish, who took lovers and insomniacs know. the street. On my way down he leaned to his bed for a year for yearning love of over the edge of the booth and said qui a woman he saw in a river, and of Aoife G REAT AMERIC AN SONG WRITER etly: Which of you by being anxious can of Connacht, who took to her bed for a Brian Wilson famously took to his bed add one cubit to the span of his life? year, emerging only to change her step for three years, as had his hard-fisted A very good question. children into swans, for which she was Irish father Murray. The writer Brendan Yet, anxious, we take to the bed, sad punished by being changed into a gray Behan's grandmother took to her bed for dled by despair and dissonance and disease, vulture, doomed to live on the wing as three years, sending her son out to the pub riddled by muddledness and madness, rat long as time endured; which is to say that every afternoon for a bucket of porter, and tled by malaise and misadventure, and in she could never take to her bed until the ruling her clan from the fortress of her the ancient culture of my forebears this end of the world, which is a long time to four-poster, dressing every day for visitors, was not so unusual, it happened in every be deprived of a particularly Irish form of and finally rising from her bed without clan, a brother to the bed or a mother to refuge, retreat, restoration, surrender, defi apology or explanation and resuming her the mattress for a day, a week, a month, ance, passivity, prayer, and sadness. former bipedality. A friend in Mayo tells a year, three years, the rest of her allotted In Irish culture, taking to the bed is me of his friend Annie Mary's mother, days; and ultimately what is there to won not considered especially odd. People did who took to her bed one day for no reason der at in this? For from the bed we came and do it for understandable reasons- ill anyone could tell, no physical ailment or and to it we shall return, and our nightly health, or the black dog, or, most horri complaint did she state, no wound of the voyages there are nutritious and restora fyingly, to die during An Gorta Mor, the world apparent, and she stayed so long tive, and we have taken to our beds for a great hunger, when whole families took abed, years and years, that eventually she thousand other reasons, loved and argued to their beds to slowly starve. There are was called the cran, that is the tree, the and eaten and seethed there, and sang black days upon me every year when I rooted one. This was told to me by a man and sobbed and suckled, and burned with cannot help but see those families in their told it by his cousin who was raised under fevers and visions and lust, and huddled skeletal beds, the wet wind snarling, the thatch four fields away from Annie Mary, and curled and prayed. As children we all, infant boy whimpering, the last moans of so you may be sure it is true. every one of us, pretended the bed was a the mother, the father weeping silently, I know a man who once took not to the boat; so now, when we are so patently and the daughter staggering up at the last to bed but to the top of a telephone booth, persistently and daily at sea, why not seek fold the arms of her family across their late in the afternoon, and there he stayed a ship? • chests as bony as birds. deep into the night, on the theory, as he So many dead in the bed. said, that as long he was atop the booth Brian Doyle is the editor of Portland Ma g And in our time: I know a woman who none of his problems could get at him, no azine at the University of Portland, in took to her bed for a week after September decisions or mistakes need he make. He Oregon, and the author most recently of 11 , and people who have taken to their had, as he said, placed himself in paren Leaping, a collection of essays. His work beds for days on end to recover from shat theses amid the sentence of life, and there appears in the Best American Essays tered love affairs, the death of a child, a he wished to stay for a time, considering anthologies of 1998, 1999, and 2003. A physical injury that heals far faster than the lilies of the field, how they grow, and collection of his essays about writers and the psychic wound gaping under it. I've the birds of the air, who did not sow nor musicians, Spirited Men, will be pub done it myself twice, once as a youth did they reap; which he did, until a police- lished in October by Cowley Publications and once as a man, the first time in sheer man came. of Boston. JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EURE KA STREET 47 Juli ette H ughes & Lucille Hughes A century of giving Th e legacy of th e Felton Bequest M CCBOURNC NOW "" two m>JO< by Archipenko, among others.' able provincial art gall ery without it. We arc galleries-NGV Australia and NGV Fundraising is part of the duties of all what we are because of Alfred Felton's huge, International, and it's hard not to smile gallery directors, but the rationing is what amazing gift. And at that poi nt the Victorian when walking out of Flinders Street Station makes the difference. The NGV is often Government bowed ou t of collections. So into a gigantic new arts precinct after doing mentioned in the same brea th as the name much has been given to us from private ben without for so long. 0 brave new world, of Melbourne businessman Alfred Felton. efactors, not taxpayers' money. As a you ng that has such buildings in it 1 As artist It's now a hundred years since he died, leav boy I was taken to the National Gallery and Robert Motherwell once said, people just ing the then enormous sum of £191,500 to I wa inspired by things like the wonderful naturally accept modern buildings. The Victoria's National Gallery. Felton was a Rembrandt drawings which the gallery was Ian Potter Gallery in Federation Square dedicated art collector but his taste was of able to buy. The income fro m the Bequest in opened its doors in 2002 and the public has its time, running mainly to middle-of-the those da ys also meant that every year some been pouring in ever since. The refurbished road landscapes. His was one of Melbourne's thing exciting was being acquired. ' N GV International in St Kilda Road finally great 19th-century success stories. A watch It's not so much the overall funding that reopened in December 2003 to accolades, maker's assistant, he emigrated from East a gallery receives, but other factors including and scores have been to the Caravaggio Anglia in the north-west of England during the ratio and history of private and public exhibition. the Victorian gold-rush years and ended up funding. From the time of Felton onward Gerard Vaughan, director and CEO of at the head of a business empire. He believed there have been others who have strength the National Gallery of Victoria, must be in art as a force for good in society, and when ened the culture of arts endowment. The one of the busiest people in Australia. Any he made his will he was farsighted enough Myers, the Murdochs, the Baillicus dream of a soul-baring interaction with Mr not to place restrictive conditions on the Melbourne's cultural hi tory has an unbro Vaughan was dashed by the circumstances use of his money. He did stipulate that the ken chai n of the scions of establi shment, of the interview. Yes, he could find a window gallery was to keep its purchases, which has deepl y involved in the arts. Some ga ll eries for me-in the taxi on the way to Sydney been lucky for the NGV. It now has holdings now institute flagship programs to educate Airport and then suggested I call again after under the Felton Bequest worth business leaders in the benefits of 'qualita he landed, in the taxi from Tullamarine /'"r around $1 billion. tive rather than quantitative returns' to to the carpark of the NGV. After serv ju stify sponsorship of the arts to sharehold ing as director of the British Museum .1. HE FELTON BEQUEST Trustees were ers. In this climate, a gallery's director has Development Trust in London for fiv e years, always very conservative about investment. to maintain complex relationships between he replaced Timothy Potts as director of In the '60s the international art market the trustees, the funding bodies, public and the NGV in 1999. He has shepherded the rocketed while the Australian doll ar dipped. private, the community the gallery serves Federation Square and St Kilda Road build By the mid '70s, it was seen that the Felton and the exceedingly volatile fashions and ings into being, both projects of mind-bog Bequest would be insufficient, and there markets in art. gling complexity, which were started by was a period of financial doldrums. Premier Outgoing director of the National former Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett. Rupert Hamer was a very enlightened man Gallery of Australia, Brian Kennedy, has 'I spend a lot of time on external rela ... (who was) ahead of his time. (He) arranged likened public art ga]\crics to secular tions with stakeholders, government rela an armual departmental allocation from ca thedrals, and their CEOs to secular tions, talking to the press and the members government funding in order to build up archbishops. His style differs from Gerard of the NGV. I'm lobbying for money a great the Bequest. He had ideas like launching Vaughan's: it's m ore outspoken and specu deal of the time, that is very important of an endowment ca mpaign. The aim was to lative, he certainly appears to have attracted course, and support fro m the community. put them back in the position they were in m ore than a director's usual share of strife. And I have to deal with a lot of straightfor 30 years (previously), when they could have In February 2003, Kennedy's reported ward administrative issues- not the day anything they wanted. ' outburst at a Senate estimates hearing to-day management, that's handled by the 'Anything they wanted' is an alluring regarding fa ults in the air-conditioning chief of finance and others. And of course I phrase: Melbourne may well be the home system at the NGA hit the press, as did have excellent professional curatorial staff. of the luckiest gallery in the nation. Not all controversy about his acquisition of David Dealing with issues like conservation of others have had such a cornucopia of money Hackney's $4.6 million A Bigger Grand works and retail operati ons. Acquisitions and good will. Canyon and Lucian Freud's $7.4 million program- we have some very exciting 'The N GV has one of the world's great After Cezanne-and all this amid rumours works coming up. We are getting a sculpture art collections. We would only be a respect- about low staff morale. In early June, only 48 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 a few days after this interview with Gerard infrastructure. In collaboration with the Vaughan, The A ge published an article by Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Lauren Martin that placed these issues in it's an opportunity for big, powerful issues high relief, as it were. During the interview in contemporary art to be seen. Many of with Vaughan, I had wondered if the Felton the best new artists now are working with Bequest and similar private funding meant the screen and other new media instead of that NGV had a more independent position the traditional canvas- things like film, from government than the NGA because of photography, design of video games, inter a different ratio of public to private fund active computer-based works. ing. I asked Vaughan for his perspective. What have been some of the highlights 'I can't possibly comment on that. I'm a of the last five years? public servant and the basic principle here 'There've been so m any fantastic is that I'm employed to do a job. While I'm things. The biggest challenge has been get obviously impacted by government, I've ting those two wonderful buildings built, never felt restricted. I'm immensely grate and the incredible detail of that, and the ful for the funding, but you have to remem installing of the collections. Opening those ber that we're all competing with a huge buildings was fantastic. Another highlight number of lobbyists for funding from gov was major new acquisitions. We've done ernment. The funding is adequate- some our best, and in doing that, we've delivered times you get it, sometimes you don't. Two old men disputing by Rembrandt va n Rijn, what both the government and the people 1628. Co ll ecti on of the NGV. 'I can honestly say I've never had any of Victoria want. We've given them the pressure from government in five years. We valued at $30 million. They constitute a best buildings, the best staff, and the best had a recent incident that was politically canon of Australian major works by art collections in Australia. controversial, the very confronting work at ists such as Eugene von Guerard, Margaret 'We didn't have a Biennale this time Federation Square (Gordon Hookey's Sa cred Preston, Sidney Nolan, Brett Whiteley, around-it might be a Triennial or a four nation, scared nation, indoctrination) by Fred Williams, Peter Booth, and Frederick year initiative. We want to ride on the back an Indigenous artist, which took a stand McCubbin. Their acquisition was a major of the Sydney Biennale and attract interna on the US and Australian involvement in coup for the NGV. Vaughan explained tional visitors to both. We can't have them the Iraq conflict. Both Andrew Bolt of the the initial obstacles to NGV's acceptance coming to Melbourne after Sydney to find Herald Sun and the Opposition spokesman of the gift, and how they were nothing's happening here. We want them objected to it with Andrew Bolt demanding / eventually overcome. to know Melbourne's back in business.' it be removed. Andrew Bolt challenged the A way gallery directors put their stamp Minister to instruct us to take it down. The DRBROWN HAD INTENDED his entire on their tenure is acquisition of significant Minister refused and assured me that the collection to be on permanent display as an artwork. Brian Kennedy's Hackney and government would never involve itself in entity in perpetuity and we simply didn't Freud were momentous, controversial, censorship. have the space to house it under those con echoing James Mollison's acquisition of 'I've had some very interesting talks ditions. But we were able to reach a com Pollock's Blue Poles under the Whitlam with government which have been very promise in due course. Dr Brown wanted it Government, or indeed the NGV's own positive, collaborative. There's a consulta to be at the NGV Australia, knowing that Banquet of Cleopatra by Tiepolo, acquired tive process which works very well. In fact more than a million people per annum pass during the Depression. That and Mollison's there was a large collection of furniture, through. We chose 100 works which best vision have long since been vindicated. which we had acquired in the past, which represented the collection. It was a won The NGV has the buildings for such things we needed to dispose of, and although derful and generous compromise for Joseph now, but will the money be enough for the you would think selling off public assets Brown to make. Of course it was the end really huge acquisitions? Gerard Vaughan would not be ALP policy, we were able to of an odyssey, a saga, for him and he had hinted tantalisingly at a big purchase he convince the Minister of the necessity for wanted to donate it for 20 years.' is negotiating at the moment. When asked doing this.' The current show '2004: Australian about his own tastes, Vaughan laughed. Another significant act of private Culture Now', is an exhibition of 130 'Everything,' he said. His taste, he said was benefaction to the NGV is Dr Joseph living Australian artists. I asked him if so broad that it was hard to single things Brown's recent gift of his collection. He it represented a departure from the usual out, but he then spoke of two passions: the migrated to Australia from Poland in 1933 concentration on overseas acquisitions and French Post-Impressionists, and the subject as a 15-year-old and eventually headed the historical, collector's view of art. of his doctoral thesis, which was on the his own successful fashion business. His 'The gallery has always supported history of collections and how tastes form involvement in visual art, both as a painter Australian contemporary art. There's a and change over generations. himself and later as a gallery owner, led tradition of young practising artists being Emerging from a honeymoon with press him to build his formidable Australian art closely involved with us. Right up to and public, the NGV is still basking. • collection. For 20 years Dr Brown, now 86, ten to 15 years ago the National Gallery has been trying to find a permanent home school was training young artists. They Juliette Hughes is a freelance writer. for his 500 artworks, which have been had young practising artists as part of the Lucille Hughes is an artist. They are sisters. JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STR EET 49 thshort list A man after his own heart: A true story, Charles The Master, Colm T6ibin. Pi cador, 2004. Siebert. Sc rib e, 2004. ISBN I 920 76914 5, RRP $3 0 l ~BN 0 743 25040 0, RRP $25 Till M/ISI J.R N earing the end of this 'exploration of the heart', The Ma ster follows the life of American the author recounts an occasion on which he author H enry James at the end of the 19th tried explaining the idea fo r this book to an century. T hough admired by many, Jam es - ageing and unnamed academic. Responding ' fails at true affection, needing freedom and to Siebert's comments, the gentlem an eems I distancing himself from anyone who threat uncertain of the author's intended work, which I ens to weigh upon this liberty. CHARLES SIEBERT Col M Tollll'\ he dismissively summarises as 'some sort of Though the text is n ot plot-driven, the book about the heart'. beauty is in James' observations. We follow This is a book about a man considering his fa ther's death (of James through his life in Rome, Florence, heart disease), becoming aware of his own mortality and the possi Venice, Paris and finally settling in England. T6ibin's images bility of inheriting the same disease. It is also a study of the life of represent a stunning literary postcard of the Europe that so Siebert's father; an anonymous organ donor; harvester and recipi appealed to the American bohemian set. ent. Though impeccably researched and written with great sensi T6ibin paints his work with several raw scenes that show tivity, there is something inexact about Siebert's narrative. This great insight into human nature. The deaths of close fam is common enough in biography, but in a book about the heart I ily m embers and friends produce som e of the most moving suspect it is almost desirable. This is less a book about certainties passages in the novel due to the honesty with which T6ibfn than a history of questions. expresses James' reflections. Though the novel often remi There are rich engagements with som e of the scientific and nisces on events in James' youth, T 6ibin m oves easily between theological characterisations and caricatures of the heart through past and present. history. Siebert suggests that it is only in lived experience that the The images created in The Ma ster linger in the memory. The extremes of science and religion maintain a precarious but satisfy description of the child James hiding in the family drawing room, ing tension. listening to Dickens' David Copperfield-a novel not viewed as Charles Siebert's narrative is touching. His exploration of this appropriate for one so young-who gives himself away by crying symbol, archetype and pump is engaging at many levels. I heartily at David's mistreatm ent, is an image that remains because of it recommend it. gentle humanity. I wasn't always captivated by the text, because - Luke O'Callaghan the pace tends to m ove lowly and the constant introduction of new characters can be confusing. However it is T6ibin's narra Car Wars: How the car won our hearts and tive that makes The Ma ster compelling, allowing us to sec the conquered our cities, Cracmc Davison with Shery l honest self of Henry James. Yell and . All en & Unwin, 2004. r ~BN 1 741 14207 5, - Rachel Hewitt RRI' S29.95 'Cars are everywhere', Graem e Davison Travellers' Tales, compiled by Trevor Bo rmann. CAR writes in this history of a city and its cars. ABC Boo ks, 2004. ISBN 0 733 3136-1- 7, RRP $24. 95 'They monopolise our streets and roadways 'To be perfectly frank, journalists despise nor w s and mould the landscape to their insistent mality', Peter Lloyd confesses before describing HOW THF CAR WON OUR HEART!'> AND CONOL>EREO OUR CITIES demands.' Melbourne is a place Davison the 'bloodbath' of the Bali bombings. Although knows intimately, and about which he writes it seems a catalogue of all that is wrong with with insight. Car Wars analyses the effects of automobiles on cit this world, I couldn't help experiencing a sense ies-congestion, road trauma, suburban sprawl, motels, drive-in of levity after fi nishing Tra vellers' Tales. shopping centres, parking lots. It examines the aspirations of past Travellers' Tales contains the anecdotes of governments-from the vast freeway networks of the 1960s, to a handful of the ABC's foreign correspondents. the City Link schemes of the Kermett era. As well as insights into the world's hotspots, it offers a glimpse Davison looks at protest movem ents against expansion along into the m otives of the roving reporter. When Michael Maher waterways and through Melbourne's historic ilmer suburbs. He quotes Graham Greene's description of the jo urnalist as the examines arguments of earlier critics, such as Robin Boyd, an 'voyeur of violen ce', one wonders if perhaps this phrase is inac opponent of Australia's car-led transformation into 'Austerica' curate. For instance, Mark Corcoran's engagement with m erce He examines gender constructions and the effects cars had on the naries in Sierra Leone and Sally Sara's description of suburban lives of young people. Johannesburg inspire deep feeling. Car Wars is written engagingly, supported by m eticulous The eye for the personal characterises the accounts, satisfy research that reveals unknown episodes in transport history. In ing the n eed for information and providing a glimmer of con 1948, M elbourne's Lord Mayor, a car dealer, decided to inspect structive promise. Perhaps it is important to laugh at the woes traffic congestion in the CBD from the air. Unfortunately the rare of the world at times (C hris Clark manages to express the funny sight of a helicopter brought Melburnians out into the streets and side of Chechnya), lest we be struck by the sad fact that accord out of their cars, confounding the mayor's survey. ing to Mark Simpkin, North Koreans are often reduced to eating Car Wars is an excellent contribution to continuing develop bark and leaves while a 20 m etre high statue of their 'dear leader' ment debates. watches m agnanimously over them . - John Molloy - Nathan Kensey 50 EUREKA STRE ET JULY- AUGUST 2004 Fly fishing E.,T mmRMED wnmN 'o YeAR' of destinies intersect with a glance. The the Paris Opera. The opera-within-an-opera each other in the mid 19th century, The entire ensemble pulls its weight. The device is no mere ornament. By allowing Flying Dutchman and The Pearl Fishers sailors' chorus is suitably bouyant and the the audience to witness Zurga falling both feature capricious seas, broken vows supporting characters played with unas- under an opera's spell, it reminds us that and longing for deliverance through love suming gusto. we possess a similar opportunity. Indeed or death. Yet in almost every other regard, Thomas Studebaker's Erik deserves the production's success is contingent they are opposites. Seeing them performed special mention-a complex creation upon the audience accepting the invita in tandem heightens the contrast between combining a hunter's temperament and tion to indulge their imagination. Only by their distinct styles. Bizet's opera presents bulk with a patient tenderness evident permitting our imagination to merge with opera as entertainment, a vehicle for in his interaction with Senga. Erik is an the spectacle of the moment can we, like fantasy and erotic possibility. In Wagner's intriguing figure until the opera's dying Zurga, be transported to a faraway world work, we see opera cast in a different moments, when a directorial decision of colour and sensual promise. Without role- the midwife of consciousness. has him nonchalantly snap Senga's neck. this permission we are left looking in The elemental forces at work in The This is unfortunate, as it reduces Erik to at a 19th-century fantasy through Flying Dutchman bring forth visions and a stock villain. However nothing should weary contemporary eyes. emotions from a dream landscape which detract from the accomplishment of this may be individual or collective. Both committed cast. EXTENDED SC ENE between Zurga approaches stake their claims, just as Unlike the sombre opening of The (Michael Lewis) and Leila (Miriam both these productions vie for our favour. Flying Dutchman, The Pearl Fishers Gordon-Stewart) is spellbinding. Zurga's The production of The Flying Dutchman begins with a wink and a nudge. The cur- confession of his love for Nadir (David enjoys the advantage of a Wagnerian tain rises to uncover ... an opera set upon Hobson) appears to surprise even himself zeitgeist lending it added dignity. From which the set of another opera has been and his realisation that Leila saved his the moment the impassive face of the constructed. Receding proscenium arches life years earlier has similar impact. Leila Dutchman is plucked from darkness by in the manner of picture frames suggest has earlier proven herself to be a woman a shard of white light, an atmosphere of the joke may continue towards a distant of substance through her glistening aria foreboding and menace is established. The vanishing point- are there even more in the cavernous temple, the duet with muted baying of unseen horns quickens operas contained within this scene? Zurga consolidates her grace and poise. the pulse. John Wegner hardly puts a foot As the audience settles in, we observe This production suffers from a tenta wrong as the Dutchman. Even before Zurga settling in to watch a performance of tive portrayal of Nadir, the third member he sings a note, his presence affects. He of the menage-a-trois. The moment where appears for the first time on the empty Nadir and Leila's eyes meet in mutual deck of his ship, cradled by its exposed recognition should glow. Instead Nadir ribs, brooding. Around him the storm may is obscured in peripheral shadows. More have subsided, but within his compact tellingly, Nadir's discomfort throws into frame the howling winds have not abated. doubt the possibility of him harbouring A bearded man in a heavy coat and peaked affection for Zurga. Wagner's opera takes cap, he stands with a Napoleonic bearing. place in a state. We are not required to Commanding our attention, he is at once slip through the filters separating us from isolated, threatening, tormented. a defined time and place in the past. For Equally captivating is Senga's this reason, quite apart from the pro (Elizabeth Whitehouse) rendition of the duction's evenness, access to The Flying Dutchman's ballad. Not content to spend Dutchman is immediate and engagement interminable hours spinning thread, Senga sustained. A strong autumn program, strives to forge her own destiny. Her will which, for the record, was completed by to escape is as unyielding as iron, yet her Bellini's Norma. • summoning of the Dutchman remains sensuous, infused with delicate precision. Steve Gome is a freelance writer and The Dutchman's longing is generic-any actor. woman may save him. Senga's is par john Wegner (The Dutchman) and Eli za beth Whitehouse ticular, and we share her triumph as their (Senta) in The Flying Dutchman. Photo Jeff Busby. JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 51 price. His voice, though, is a flat disap was to ca tch the more mature and complex pointment, its lack of resonance showing tone and language of Azl 52 EUREKA STREET JULY- AUGUST 2004 is to explore grief and rage and wondrous across the border complexity in deceptively simple and into Mexico to attractive prose. This film starts to let us escape the ice into that part of her genius at last. and snow, but - Juliette Hughes being rejected as illegal immi grants (until the Climatic tragedy US promises to cancel all The Day After Tomorrow, dir. Roland La tin American Emmerich. If you've seen the trailer, or even debt), and a just the poster for The Day After Tomorrow weak President (and given the amount of advertising being manipulated and Daniel Radcliffe (a bove) and Emma Watson (right) in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban done for this film, I'd be surprised if you dominated by his haven't), then you've pretty much seen the machiavellian best parts of the film already. Vice President, clearly based on Cheney also a film about dull The premise of the film-that man and Bush. And of course, the film has gen coincidences, silly made global warming disrupts the ocean's erated more than a few minutes of press plot devices and flat currents and ironically leads to a new ice interest in things like the Kyoto protocol, performances. There age- is pretty much another excuse for and the refusal of the US (and Australia) to were some refreshingly director Roland Emmerich to gleefully ratify it, which can't be a bad thing. This frank sex scenes and at destroy famous US landmarks once again. doesn't, however, excuse it for being a times a giddy lightness In Independence Day, he gave us aliens dull, loud, silly film that (as someone said to the films direction blowing up the White House, in Godzilla, of Godzilla) aims low, and misses. that gave its dialogue a giant lizard smashing New York to -Allan James Thomas an unexpected truth. pieces. Here we get tornados smashing LA But none of this was (and the HOLLYWOOD sign in particular) enough for The Cooler to smithereens, giant waves swamping A cool gamble to come up trumps. Manhattan, and the Statue of Liberty Alec Baldwin and William H. Macy snap-frozen by super-cooled air sucked The Cooler, dir. Wayne Kramer. Is bad luck could sleep walk through their respective down from the outer atmosphere by conti contagious? Yes, no, maybe so? Whatever roles. Had Macy played the bullish thug nent-sized storms. The surf breaking over the answer William H. Macy has a conta and Baldwin the badly dressed loser The the New York skyline is actually quite gion of sorts. As an actor he has become the Cooler might have at least stepped with spectacular, and lots of fun to watch-but embodiment of the luckless bastard. Each an ungainly (granted) but engaging gait. this is five minutes of a two-hour film. new role he tackles seems infected by the As it was this film was tired before the The human interest plot (climate last sorry soul he played. Sacked, cheated, end of the first scene. Natalie Belisario researcher Dennis Quaid trying to redeem loveless and weary he wanders from film (Bernie's love interest) was played with his poor parenting skills by trudging to film with barely a costume change. And an admirable plainness by a very beauti through the snow and storms to New The Cooler is no exception. ful Maria Bello. I found her affection for York, to keep his promise to pick up his Bernie Lootz (William H. Macy) is Bernie a little hard to fathom but despite son from the now snowed-in and frozen so unlucky, Shelly (Alec Baldwin)- an that, their scenes together marked some of library) is just plain tedious, and the old style casino boss-retains him to more moving moments in the film. film-makers know it. They try to spice spread his bad vibe around the floor of I've heard it argued that Macy is the up the post-wave part of the film with the Shangri-La. And it works. The merest most over-rated actor in Hollywood. I'm escaped wolves and raging septicaemia, whiff of Bernie turns a winning streak pear tempted to agree but for his turn in the but frankly barking and blood poison shaped. But Bernie owes Shelly only one Coen brother's masterpiece Fargo. Now ing tends to lose out in the cinematic more week of service (he is paying off a there's a performance that threatens to spectacle stakes to skyscraper-sized surf. gambling debt from years earlier-part of nip up and bite any Macy detractors sharp Jake Gyllenhaal (who plays Quaid's son) is his payment was also accepting a broken and hard on the backside. Clearly he can charismatic, in a sleepy-eyed kind of way, knee). To Shelly, Bernie is the one sure bet fight the good fight when the material is but the rest of the actors may as well not left in a fragile and changing Las Vegas. His strong enough. be there for the impact they have. Let's mobster world of knee capping and Rat The Cooler is a small film that needed face it-a story about a weather man try Packed show rooms is being swamped by big, clear ideas to give it life. Notions ing to go to the library doesn't really rank IMAX cinemas and arcades, so naturally of love and chaos, luck and moral up there with the great action movie plots Shelly will do almost anything to retain his imperatives were all dancing around, but of all time, does it? luckiest loser. Kramer failed to partner them with brave There are some vaguely political digs The Cooler is a film about the conflict directorial or casting decisions. Better in there somewhere-a nice little joke between old and new, the vanities of luck next time! about hordes of US citizens trying to sneak wealth, lady luck, love and loneliness. It is -Siobhan Jackson JU LY- AUGUST 2004 EUREKA STREET 53 watching I brief Pushed and hushed 'Don't push yet.' In Canada's northern region, Inuit women have experi 'Get @#$%ed!' enced the same problems, but now have a local birth centre 'Now, now, Juliette, you know you need to pant like with Indigenous midwives. In this way they can have the bene a dog at this point.' fits of Western medicine where it is needed, without being sep 'You do it then, if it's so % "&ing easy.' arated from their culture. The Inuit have had similar problems 'OK, now you can push.' to Australian Aboriginal people, but have enjoyed a far more 'Don't want to any more.' enlightened government approach in recent years; notabl y, 'Come on love, have a go ... ' they have a treaty and some m easure of control in health mat 'I HATE YOU! GO AWAY' WHERE ARE YOU ters for their communities. There are many valiant individuals GOING? COME BACK! ' trying to make a difference in Indigenous health here, but Birth Rites makes one realise that the real obstacle is government. If A H, MEMORIES OF THE LABOUR WARD, or whatever they Canada can do it, why can't we? call it now. Probably now known as a best-practice-quality-as Since August from the 13th onwards will be dominated sured-mutual-o bliga tion extrusion facility complete with mis by the Olympics, I can safely say that I will run from the sion statem ent and vision commitment. room screaming whenever there is soccer, hockey, basket All you mums watching Birth Rites on SBS (8.30pm Thurs ball, cycling or baseball. However, I will be watching av day July 8) will remember, if you weren't mercifully doped out idly for the weightlifting, gy mnastics, field athletics, boxing at the time, how damned irritating everyone around you can be and som e of the swimming. SBS will be picking up the stuff when you are trying to get a quart out of a pint pot. The main that Seven deem s unpopular, and I think it will do well out thing to remember is how important it is not to give a labour of that, because people like me will switch on and watch ing woman a gun. the outre events that male sports fans tend to avoid. What Trying to get the process right for most women without we will agree on will be whatever incarnation the Roy and causing death and injury in the tricky business of birth is a HG team come up with. I can never forget the way we all balancing act between the constant need fo r emotional sup looked forward to The Dream in 2000. Who could forget port and the occasional need for machines that go ping. (Monty such inspiration? Putting Barry White tracks with footage of Python fans will remember that machine, and the breezy un the Graeco-Roman wrestling; the commentary that turned concern of the obstetrician-John Cleese, of course. ) If it was synchronised swimming and floor gymnastics from dagdom daunting for an urban woman, imagine what it must be like for to cool joy. Here's hoping that Seven gives them lots Indigenous women, often transported far from their families in of time this year. centralised hospitals to give birth in ways that are cut off from their culture. Birth Rites examines how this causes terribl e INTHE MEANTIME, T HIS DOUBLE issue will see the welcome social and m edical problems: women will often avoid the lo demise of yet another Big Brother, which was notable among cal clinics until it is too late in their pregnancies to send them reality shows this year in that it actually contained something away into isolation from their families. real. When Merlin Luck emerged fro m the house, self-gagged T hat reminded me of a documentary I saw on the ABC with tape and holding a sign saying 'Free th[e] Refugees' he years ago, about the discovery of the need for basic hygiene in subverted the whole ghastly totalitarian charade. He was not obstetrics. In Vienna in the early 19th century, pregnant wom the docile manipulee that such artificially constructed shows en would get their cab drivers to circle the hospital until they depend on. Havi ng smuggled in his small fabric sign (they arc were almost on the point of delivery, because they knew that not permitted any writing implements), he followed through the longer they were in the place, the more likely they were to courageously and refused to spoil the gesture by taking off the die of puerperal fever, at the filthy hands of ignorant doctors. gag to have a deep and meaningless chat with the increasingly The paradox is a cruel one: in Australia at the exact same time, enraged Gretel Killeen. He reminded us that there are other in parts where Indigenous societies hadn't been reached by the people in this country who are confined and under surveil white colonists, they were having babies cleanly and naturally, lance, but who haven't chosen to be treated like that. Is it too as they had done for countless thousands of years. The 21st much to hope that this signifies the end of the whole damn century urban hospital system still threatens Indigenous exist dreary catchpenny faux-reality business? • ence, if not by infection, then by cutting women off from crucial support from their communities. Juliette Hughes is a freelance writer. 54 EU REKA STREET JU LY- AUGUST 2004 ~J ?.:~~:!:tny IBVM puzzled l J l\ Eureka Street Cryptic Crossword no.l25, JULY-AUGUST 2004 ACROSS 1. Safeguarded against certain surrounding noise. (7) 5. Delivered one's party piece, perhaps. (7) 9. Parking for almost a quarter, strangely, on the patterned floor. (7) 10. Sitting on the fence, uninvolved. (7) 11 . Which man in the field is on the offside boundary? Closer by a fraction. (5) 12. It looks like a rock on the seabed- a venomous creature. (9) 13. Orthographically possible to be bewitched? (9) 15. Wind about the east-for a stretch! (5) 16. Robustly energetic, if somewhat confused, without Robert. (5) 18. A poser on the counterpane in the small apartment. (9) 21. Does it tell us how to identify the Chablis, for instance? (4,5) 24. Time to tear oneself away from the current fashion. (5) 25. Perhaps Adam ran fast this month in Saudi Arabia, for instance. (7) 26. Inconsequential game? They're the sort of pursuits that rival it somehow. (7) 27. Left or right, footballers keep their politics off the field. (7) 28. Busy with fiancee. (7) DOWN 1. Attributes letter exchange to a driving force. (7) 2. Car m aintenance could be let ? (7) Solution to Crossword no. 124, June 2004 3. Run about circle, then slow up for song. (9) 4. Escorts often enjoy fruits. (5) 5. Hurry to glimpse one of the top players; he has becom e quite bedraggled. (3,2,4) 6. The producer will uphold the ideals of the group. (5) 7. Hung around for the rat-ride, perhaps, so obviously not in the rat-race. (7) 8. Hold pin arrangement to catch the cetacean. (7) 14. Will this election promise provide a dividend for the offspring? (4,5) 15. Doing this in the dark may keep up the spirits. (9) 16. Facial aspect that reveals plebeian tastes? (7) 17. Does he come from the beach when the children go to sleep? (7) 19. Abundant evidence of committee minginess can be found here. (7) 20. Annoyed about the Doctor's argument; it is shot through with holes. (7) 22. Boy the French used to serve the soup, perhaps. (5) 23 . Some slat he shaped with a tool. (5) Thi s subsc ripti on is: Your Contact Details: Gift to: (Please also fill in your own contact details, left) D New D Renewal D Gift IMrsJM,ss/Ms/Mr First Name II Mrs/M"s/Ms/Mr First Name Length of subscripti on: ~Su=rn=am=e======;~Su=rn=am=e======~ D O ne year (1 0 iss ues for $70, $60 concession for IStreet No. Street Name II Street No. Street Name pensioners, students and unemployed. In c. GST.) ~======~ 0 Two years (2 0 issues for $125, $110 concession. In c. GST.) 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IMAGINE a place wHere you can: spend hours browsing a vast range of resources, ministries and missions. talk with missions and ministries about giving, volunteering, prayer support. attend seminars on topical issues. _:..A. Exhibition and Event ,A. ....,.- Association of Au stralia 8th- 10th JULY 2004 INTERESTED IN EXHIBITING? SYDNEY SHOWGROUND (03) 5241 1478 or email: OLYMPIC PARK [email protected] S10 ad SSIOn Present this advert; admit two for the price of one! (Seminars included in cost of admission)